Breeding Cornish X and other projects. I know nothing!

[MysteryChicken]

Thank you @Molpet and @MysteryChicken for the ideas. Of course, all of my breeding projects count on the business taking, and being able to revamp my run soon to create "breeding pens". I'm hoping by next summer I'll be able to work on some crosses so we'll see how it goes. Thanks again everyone, this is great info!

You're welcome.

 

[Pollito Pelon]

I want to later try to breed my asil x shamo rooster with Cornish x or try to cross him with my buff orpingtons for meat or naked neck.
The asil cross should help improve meat growth

 

[U_Stormcrow]

@Weeg I've got a backyard project of my own going, with hatchery birds. Involved a ROO of unknown genetics, and later, one of his sons. Its NOT very far along, and its NOT being approached very scientifically, but...

I've crossed over both a CX hen, and a number of Dark Brahma hens, repeatedly.

All the offspring of the CX hen get the dominant white, with leakage. Sample size is small, but I'm batting 50/50 on size for the offspring. Both roosters have been pretty standard in size themselves. The first was one I adopted, didn't see him grow up - or even know his age. The current breeding rooster was almost exactly 3# at 9 weeks and a few days, and has weighed in at just over 6# since five months. His slightly larger male sibling was 5.85# at 18 weeks when I culled him. The CX hen was recently culled - she was going thru a hard molt and suffering in the FL heat and humidity. I chose to eat her rather than risk loosing her, since her laying had almost stopped - age 14 months. Made good breakfast sausage.

The Dark Brahma offspring have been, frankly, disappointments. The hens themselves remain "not large" at over a year in age, and the offspring are (like their dames) very slow to bulk up. A couple are slightly larger than their siblings as we come into the 4-5 month range from the February hatchings - but you don't look at any of them and think "outstanding". If I didn't want their pattern genes, I'd abandon them in my program (still might, now that I have some offspring with genes for both the Brahma Pattern and Barring).

Examples? I culled a Brahma offspring female at just over 13 weeks - 52.7 oz. Another 61.6 oz, same age. At 17 weeks, a brahma mama cockerel was 73.4 oz when culled, and his sister (same age) 75.7 oz.