Are these actually Dark Cornish?

[dedoubt]

I am living on my friends' farm & helping out. They ordered 40 Dark Cornish chicks (can't remember which hatchery) to raise for meat in September. They are almost 10 weeks now & do not look like any photos I have found of Dark Cornish birds.

Did the hatchery send us the wrong birds? Pic of them the day they arrived & a few from yesterday.

 

[Duck_life]

@Cyprus @Gray Farms are these Yokohamas or something else? Very tall and pretty.

 

[Cyprus]

These look like hatchery quality White Laced Red Cornish.

 

[dedoubt]

Thanks, you guys.

Apparently there was some sort of mix up on my friend's end or the hatchery's (Stromberg)- we just called & confirmed that they did indeed send us the White Laced Red Cornish.

Well, I can stop wondering when they will get their dark coloration, ha ha.

Any ideas on weeks to slaughter? Hard to find that information- McMurray told me Dark Cornish are 16-18 weeks- or 24-36- it was a confusing phone call. Stromberg's just told us SIX MONTHS. The website said "slow rate of growth" but my friend took that to mean maybe 4 months... We were not planning on having them through most of the winter, jeez. (Imagining my purple frozen hands doing their water every morning is not fun...)

 

[Molpet]

I have a dark, he was hatched with a couple mix breeds.... which were ready at 16 weeks. He would be ready about10 wks later.

 

[Gray Farms]

These look like hatchery quality White Laced Red Cornish.

Agreed 100%

 

[Gray Farms]

Butcher at around 14-16 weeks

 

[Mosey2003]

I imagine this happens a bit more often with Stromberg's than other places, because they aren't actually a hatchery, they simply take your order and then place the order with an actual hatchery that ships your chicks.

Regular Cornish are going to take longer to be a good size, yes. Especially hatchery ones. Look over at Archery Rob's post in this forum about raising Cornish, he just butchered two 24 week cockerels and you can see their size.