BREEDING FOR PRODUCTION...EGGS AND OR MEAT.

[bnjrob]

So here's what's for dinner tomorrow night. You may all remember I'm working toward butchering my first, home grown capon for next Thanksgiving. I'll be getting White and Silver Gray Dorkings in the spring to be ready for a big party we go to every Thanksgiving. This brand of Minowa Capon shows up at my local Kroger every year at a dirt cheap price of about $2.50 per pound. This bird is about 7.5 pounds and cost $19. Trying it is part of my research to learn everything capony. I've looked up Minowa online and all I can find is that it is packed for Schlitz Foods in South Dakota. My guess is that it's a total fake and is just an overgrown broiler (Cornish Cross). I doubt that it was even surgically altered but that's all just guess work. I'd love to know if anyone knows any more about Minowa Capons, their breed, their production method, anything. I'd even like to know if you've tasted one or heard rumor. And please don't flame me for buying a commercial chicken. It's all in the name of research.

Won't know till you try it.

 

[DesertChic]

FYI...My daughter just called me an old f##t....because I've complained relentlessly about the constant thunderstorms and drizzle. I guess when you're in love,walking in the warm rain is romantic but I just son't remember it that way when I was a young man (kid). I used the rain as an excuse to talk a 'girlfriend' to make for an old barn to check for eggs...even we all knew that barn hadn't had a chicken in in decades.

I know Ariel uses those words as terms of endearment. While I'm holding her passport for security reasons, I doubt she'd care if I go home and leave her right here.

LOL! Too funny! Aahhh....young love! I think you should've vacationed in AZ instead. Although we'll have rain tomorrow, it's been in the 70s and sunny most of this past week.

 

[DesertChic]

I started to put chicken manure in my garden last year. In the spring and fall. Now, I till it in April and cannot plant most crops until the first of June.

I compost all the pine chicken bedding and add that to my garden. It works great! All of my outdoor gardening is done in raised beds filled with compost because the AZ soil is too sterile for most garden produce to survive. Even what's left of the alfalfa hay I feed the chickens in the winter goes to soil improvement and protecting fragile plants from water loss.

Now that my aquaponics is up and running I'm looking forward to year-round fresh out-of-season produce from there. I transplanted some tomato plants, a squash plants, lettuce, kale and Swiss chard, and some herbs into it with great success, and direct seeded more herbs, some beans and cucumbers so far with equal success. Seeds are sprouted days faster in the aquaponics than they ever have in soil...and I haven't even added the earthworms yet! This is super exciting for a brown-thumb gardener like myself.

 

[AnthNDacula]

I had a friend who tried cooking up a batch of pig anus once.

She got the oven too hot and rectum....

 

[Beer can]

Those who have ate capons is there a scar of any sort from the process that you have noticed when you cook them?

@AnthNDacula I have heard there is cornish x capons just kinda defeats the purpose being they are butcher ready before sexual maturity. Even if it is a X it probably was caponized. My guess would be not a X but then you'd imagine the price would be higher. Capons I've seen I think were labeled barred rock.

 

[Beer can]

Can't wait to try jersey Giant capons. Right now I have a six month old six lb cockerel in the oven surrounded with carrots tators and onions. And a young wellie ee cross same way. First birds I've ever brined first. Dry rubbed them.
I usually marinate them.

 

[Mini Meat]

I have questions for the people who have or have had NN.

I have never owned them and was never before interested in them until reading this thread and learned they have meaty carcasses.

Is the carcass quality at all tied to the NN gene? In other words, is an Nn bird likely to be less meaty than an NN bird?

If you cross breed them, introducing them into a line only in the first generation, say DCxNN then DCxDC/NN then DCxDC/DC/NN (I hope that makes sense) how long is the thin feathering maintained?

Has anyone done a DCxNN cross?

How did you like the cross as meat birds?

Please and thank you

 

[draye]

I have questions for the people who have or have had NN.

I have never owned them and was never before interested in them until reading this thread and learned they have meaty carcasses.

Is the carcass quality at all tied to the NN gene? In other words, is an Nn bird likely to be less meaty than an NN bird?

If you cross breed them, introducing them into a line only in the first generation, say DCxNN then DCxDC/NN then DCxDC/DC/NN (I hope that makes sense) how long is the thin feathering maintained?

Has anyone done a DCxNN cross?

How did you  like the cross as meat birds?

Please and thank you

I've never crossed mine to DC, but to other breeds. A lot of the qualities you're asking is all in the particular line if birds you get. I wouldn't think there'd be any difference in the NN or an NN.

I've never ordered any if S & G's NN's but have read by folks reviewing them that they have meatier type breasts than youmr average NN.

Check out my new avatar. That cockerel is only 20+ weeks old and see the size of his legs and breast. He is 1/4 EE and you know those birds aren't very big.

 

[h2oratt]

Easily said.  I'm not one who necessarily believes that form follows function.  I handled dogs in AKC, UKC and American Rare Breed Association.   I witnessed what breeding to form has done to so many dog breeds.  I know...Apples and oranges.

But the beauty of dogs vs chickens is we can eat our failures in the poultry world.

 

[DesertChic]

I have questions for the people who have or have had NN.

I have never owned them and was never before interested in them until reading this thread and learned they have meaty carcasses.

Is the carcass quality at all tied to the NN gene? In other words, is an Nn bird likely to be less meaty than an NN bird?

If you cross breed them, introducing them into a line only in the first generation, say DCxNN then DCxDC/NN then DCxDC/DC/NN (I hope that makes sense) how long is the thin feathering maintained?

Has anyone done a DCxNN cross?

How did you like the cross as meat birds?

Please and thank you

In my experience so far, the NN vs the Nn hasn't made a difference in how meaty they are in and of themselves. One of my NN right now is rather skinny, whereas another is super meaty. I have the same experiences with Nn birds. The difference comes from the genetics of the individual bird including what was crossed to breed it. I haven't yet tried the DC x NN cross, but it's on the list as party of my breeding plans.

Right now I'm working on improving my pure NN line first, and then I'll start cross-breeding.

Here are two of my NNs to show how different the body styles can be:


Ozzy has a nice, meaty frame with good breast and thighs.


Ruby is mostly feather and frame.