Breeding for meat qualities in a sustainable dual purpose breed

[DiVon80]

Remember I am learning ! Why do you want fast maturing?

 

[saladin]

Tim,

Most commercial stock is either 3 or 4 different lines not 2.

When 2 different breeds are put together what you generally get is something in between the 2; it doesn't grow as fast or as large as one and it doesn't grow as slow or as small as the other.

However, in the combination of 3 or even 4 things come out quite differently. Now, it also is important that the 3 or 4 different lines (or breeds) be as inbred as they possibly can without losing vigor or health themselves.

If I were doing what you propose I would use the following breeds:

Exhibition Cornish (for the very broad breast)
Madagascar Game or Turken if you can't get the Madagascar (also broad breast and very large bird)
Maran (fastest growing heritage breed I know of)

I'd mate the Maran to the Cornish and the F1 offspring to the Madagascar.

That's just my opinion. Great thing about breeding is that you can gather all kinds of opinions and then DO WHAT YOU WANT TO THE WAY YOU WANT TOO!!!

Good luck with the project.

Oh, remember for sustainability you need to maintain the purity of your 3 original lines to capture heterosis.

 

[TimG]

Quote:
For two reasons:

1) The faster they grow, the sooner they will turn into meat; if they mature earlier they will start laying eggs at a younger age. Both of these generally mean less feed per unit of product.

2) As I understand things, the older the chicken at slaughter, the tougher the meat tends to be.

 

[TimG]

Quote:
Thanks for the suggestions. I do appreciate them all.

 

[pocopoyo]

How about Buckeyes?

Whatever you go with, you will probably need to do some work to get them to produce meat like you want. Most of the heritage / standard breeds have been neglected when it comes to production traits. The good news that if you hatch a lot and cull hard (eat a lot), you can improve them pretty quickly. Select males for size, select females for egg production.

Cornish cross are ready to butcher in 6 to 8 weeks. Heritage breeds are going to take 16 to 20 weeks to get to the same size. Better flavor though.

 

[TimG]

Quote:
None of the books or genetics websites that I have read suggest that males pass on size any more than females, nor that females pass on egg production any more than males (or the male line!).

Or, are you just saying that for the dual purpose aspect the keepers will be big males and productive females?

 

[Ryu]

One of the Breed Preservation websites has an article on how to select breeding stock for re-vitalizing a strain. They project they did was for Buckeyes I believe.

They had certain characteristics they looked for in roos and hens, and bascially explained how to do the whole thing. I am using some of their guidelines to hopefully improve my Cornish and establish my own line.

I can try to find it online again if you want....too late for me right now.

 

[Ryu]

The articles I was referring to are on the ABLC Website under educational resources. They even have a chart of the breeds with all of the breed characteristics (maturity, egg production, ect.) you're interested in.

Good Luck!

 

[Kim_NC]

I'm working on a project idea for a sustainable meat bird. Understand, I'm not there yet - but perhaps sharing my thoughts/ideas will help.

1) We raise NHReds and have added Delawares this year. We sell eggs and POL pullets. We also cross RIR roo X Delaware for Red Sexlink pullets. I've actually found I like the RIR a little better for the laying cross.

Anyway, the result of that is: we butcher excess NHR, RIR and RSL cockerels at 18-19 weeks. The ave carcass size is 3 lb - small but tender. The cockerels from the RSL cross may ave another 1/4 lb or so. (I'll have to pay more attention to that next time we butcher.) We even fry them or grill them with good tender results.

2) An acquaintance on another forum raises colored range broilers from JM Hatchery. They are really sold on them. They quote their personal results as: 10 weeks for a 5lb bird and pullets laying at 20 weeks. Pullets lay a large egg. They had 80% hatch rates reproducing from the parent stock this year. They've had no health problems with the mature, year-old parent stock. The offspring have the same results in coloring, growth, weight, temperament.

I want to start a line of these based on their shared experience. I'm either going to order from JM, or get hatching eggs from the friend/acquaintance. (They're within reasonable driving for me.)

3) There is a fellow named Tim Shell from VA who had a sustainable line of meat chickens going from an original cross of Delawares and Cornish X. He called them 'Corndel Cross'. Try googling the name, there's a few articles out there worth a read. He's since moved to China. Here's another post where his cross was discussed:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=75064

I may try to do something similar using a 3 line system as Saladin is suggesting. I could use my existing Delaware and RIR lines, and the JM Hatchery rangers. If I can get everything together to start the JM rangers this Summer, I could make the FI x Ranger cross next season.

4) You might find reading this 'Alternatives to the Cornish Cross' article by Harvey Ussery of interest:
http://www.backyardpoultrymag.com/issues/4/4-2/alternatives_to_the_cornish_cross.html

Thanks for the thread and the shared ideas from everyone.

edited to add a link

 

[TimG]

Quote:
I've read the articles you are referring to. From Chapter 1 (Meat Qualities):

A producer needs far fewer males than females to be
retained for breeding stock. With this in mind, rigorous
selection of the males is an important component to a
sound, breeding program. It should also be remembered
that adult size is controlled by the size of the female
stock – under-sized or otherwise poor quality females
should not be retained. Better to hatch more chicks
from fewer hens, than to retain under-sized or poor
quality hens to increase flock size.

It is unclear to me whether the author is saying that hens have genetic control of size (something that I haven't found in any serious breeding documents) or whether he is just making an observation that hen size is just as important as rooster size and should not be overlooked. If anyone has a pointer to a study addressing this issue, I would appreciate it if you'd mention it in this thread.

The breed comparison chart is a bit odd. It seems that in every other source the Buckeye is considered slower maturing, but in this chart is says medium (16-20 weeks). It also lists the Jersey Giant as medium (16-20 weeks). In other reading it has been said that Jersey Giants are amongst the slowest to pack on the meat. Two people in this thread have suggested that Marans are the fastest growing breed they know, but those are also listed as medium (16-20 weeks).

The chart includes an note that "Much of this information was gleaned from the catalog published by the Sand Hill Preservation Center, Calamus, Iowa" so the notes on this chart might be connected to where Sand Hill is in their progress towards attaining their goals?

For all that, there are three breeds on the chart that are listed as fast growing: New Hampshire, Delaware and Plymouth Rock. Of those, only Delawares have a note for "rate of lay" (that note is "very good").​