B.Y.C. Dorking Club!

[Yellow House Farm]

Greenhorn! Excellent to hear about the selection. It sounds like you knew where to go. They're defintiely a "project", but their worthy of your efforts. You're definitely going to enjoy the eating. If they're 6 month cockerels, the fool proff way to cook them is to put them into a dutch over, rub it down with olive oil in spice then put in a covered dutch oven with a glass or two of wine. Cook it at 325 for 25 minutes per pound. Set the timer put it in and don't disturb. When the timer goes off, it's ready to go.


I go over the pullets in late January, when they're well matured and in strong production. I've found that you can tell a lot just with the handling of them and feeling their weight.

Joseph

 

[Jwhip]

Greenhorn with that building you should have Dorkings everywhere this spring.

 

[greenhorn]

Thanks again Yellow House! Finally got some pics of the last four cockerels. The wife has a Dorking in the oven and it's almost done. Your recipe sounds delicious and we'll definitely give it a try. Tonight we are having it cooked in the oven in a cooking bag lol. It usually turns out great but I'm going to look into getting a Dutch oven. That's the more healthy way of doing it.

Thank you Jwhip, Bently, and RedBugPoultry we are really looking forward to next spring.

Here are some more pictures:

 

[greenhorn]

 

[capayvalleychick]

Those are some lucky birds! That's a barn that most people only dream about.


How do you all weigh your birds? I'm not sure that my scales would be accurate.

 

[greenhorn]

Thank you capayvalleychick. We do feel fortunate to have such a nice chicken coop for breeding our Dorkings. It cost more than we were hoping but it's a good sturdy structure and should last a long time. The birds will have excellent protection because they are completely enclosed, inside and out. During the day when we can observe our whites we will let them out to free range. Can't be too careful, we've lost some nice birds to dogs and other predators in the past.

I have to say our Dorking chicken dinner was excellent. We will definitely be keeping Dorkings on the farm from here on out!

Thanks everybody for sharing your experiences and knowledge. Yellow House you have been a blessing to our farm and we can't thank you enough for sharing your whites and your knowledge. I look forward to trying out that recipe for 6 month old cockerels. Our kids all loved the Dorking dinner also and wow is that dark and white meat awesome from those birds. One of the few meals we can make without at least one of the kids complaining, and it's super good for them.

We finally got a new card reader and it's all set up so we will be sharing more pictures now. Hope to find time to get more pics of the hens, particularly the white ones. Finding more white eggs every day. Some are getting larger and some look like first timers. By hatching season we should be all set. I know the cockerels are already fertile because we had a broody ISA Brown hen hatch two five toed chicks with rose combs. Wasn't on purpose or anything, we just didn't have space to keep the cockerels and laying hens separate at the time..... We get a few mutts here from time to time and it's kinda fun really. The kids love raising up chicks and it helps them understand a little about genetics and breeding. Not that I consider that breeding at all but they can see how certain traits are dominate like five toes and rose combs for instance. Or how we can track down which kind of chickens were the parent birds etc. We won't be hatching anymore mutts anytime soon though, got rid of the broody hens eggs and the cockerels are no longer sharing space with them.

I had 2 black hens that kept flying the hen coop so we rounded those 2 up and added 3 more and took 5 black hens over and put them in with one of the smaller white roosters. The coops are covered over there and i don't think the blacks are laying yet. This will let me know when they begin to lay just so i know. Right now there are no big plans to work with the blacks though. We may let them free range separate areas from the whites and hatch a few just to keep them going. Didn't find any great black cockerels at all though. We got mostly hens from the blacks but did find 2 or 3 I like. The 2 black hens that kept flying the coop are together in the picture above this post.

Will be back with more soon....

 

[heritagehabitatfarms]

your setup is looking great

where did u get the blacks from??? you might consider getting a cuckoo rooster to put over the black hens if u cant find a black roo... tho you might get some good blacks from a white rooster as the white is recessive... i know YHF has said they used silver gray in there whites and I'm not sure if that would show threw on the blacks or not...

Thank you capayvalleychick. We do feel fortunate to have such a nice chicken coop for breeding our Dorkings. It cost more than we were hoping but it's a good sturdy structure and should last a long time. The birds will have excellent protection because they are completely enclosed, inside and out. During the day when we can observe our whites we will let them out to free range. Can't be too careful, we've lost some nice birds to dogs and other predators in the past.

I have to say our Dorking chicken dinner was excellent. We will definitely be keeping Dorkings on the farm from here on out!

Thanks everybody for sharing your experiences and knowledge. Yellow House you have been a blessing to our farm and we can't thank you enough for sharing your whites and your knowledge. I look forward to trying out that recipe for 6 month old cockerels. Our kids all loved the Dorking dinner also and wow is that dark and white meat awesome from those birds. One of the few meals we can make without at least one of the kids complaining, and it's super good for them.

We finally got a new card reader and it's all set up so we will be sharing more pictures now. Hope to find time to get more pics of the hens, particularly the white ones. Finding more white eggs every day. Some are getting larger and some look like first timers. By hatching season we should be all set. I know the cockerels are already fertile because we had a broody ISA Brown hen hatch two five toed chicks with rose combs. Wasn't on purpose or anything, we just didn't have space to keep the cockerels and laying hens separate at the time..... We get a few mutts here from time to time and it's kinda fun really. The kids love raising up chicks and it helps them understand a little about genetics and breeding. Not that I consider that breeding at all but they can see how certain traits are dominate like five toes and rose combs for instance. Or how we can track down which kind of chickens were the parent birds etc. We won't be hatching anymore mutts anytime soon though, got rid of the broody hens eggs and the cockerels are no longer sharing space with them.

I had 2 black hens that kept flying the hen coop so we rounded those 2 up and added 3 more and took 5 black hens over and put them in with one of the smaller white roosters. The coops are covered over there and i don't think the blacks are laying yet. This will let me know when they begin to lay just so i know. Right now there are no big plans to work with the blacks though. We may let them free range separate areas from the whites and hatch a few just to keep them going. Didn't find any great black cockerels at all though. We got mostly hens from the blacks but did find 2 or 3 I like. The 2 black hens that kept flying the coop are together in the picture above this post.

Will be back with more soon....

 

[Jwhip]

Nice males greenhorn. A few of my Dorkings

 

[greenhorn]

your setup is looking great

where did u get the blacks from??? you might consider getting a cuckoo rooster to put over the black hens if u cant find a black roo... tho you might get some good blacks from a white rooster as the white is recessive... i know YHF has said they used silver gray in there whites and I'm not sure if that would show threw on the blacks or not...

Hey thanks so much heritagehabitatfarms. The blacks came from SandHill. I was wondering about white being recessive but both colors need a bit of work. Blacks way more than white though. I wouldn't want to put whites on blacks until I at least have my whites straightened out. My main focus is going to be with the whites for some time to come though.

 

[greenhorn]

Nice males greenhorn. A few of my Dorkings

Those are beautiful birds! Nice pictures Jwhip. Hoping to get better tails like your birds have next season. The new coop should help out a little in that area. Keep up the great work!