Best way to raise meat chickens

[max13077]

Some friends and I are thinking of getting about a hundred meat chickens to try and put a dent in our rising food bills. With two out of the three having large family’s to feed, it’s getting expensive fast. We were wondering what the best way to raise say Cornish X’s is? What type of housing is best for them? What sort of feeding regimens work best? Do they need a pen? We’re just curious to see what is needed and what the best circumstances is to raise them.

I have chickens of my own that were originally going to serve us in one capacity or the other at the end of the fall. That however kind of fell by the wayside when they “endeared” themselves to me over the last few months. So with these hopefully I can keep clear the thought that they are purely for food.

 

[jaku]

It's pretty tough to raise meat birds and actually save money over the cheap meat you can get at the grocery store. You'll get a lot better meat for your money though! I use a tractor that I move to fresh ground every day, which keeps them out of their own poo, and keeps the smell at zero. Any permanent coop will need cleaning daily and will stink. I have 21, and I fill their feeder in the morning, and I've been letting it run out at night. I've found that this is much easier to do when they're out of the brooder- not sure if they're finding other things to eat, or what, but when I took away food at night in the brooder, they went crazy and ate themselves almost to death when I returned food in the morning. Greyfields and MissPrissy are a great source of information in this area- take my advice with a grain of salt, as I only have 4 weeks experience.

Here's a couple pics of my tractor: