Can I cross a meat chicken with a dual purpose rooster?

[PTA Chicks]

When you say free range I envision your flock feeding themselves through foraging and you not providing any feed. I grew up on a farm like that but we had to supplement their feed some in winter. With your climate even that may not be necessary. So yes your koek-koek's will be scrawnier than ones fattened on a high protein feed with little exercise.

I'm not sure what broilers you are talking about, I assume the Cornish X and not the Ranger type bird. I think either is worth a try. Foraging like that could easily work to limit their weight enough that you can get some egg layering females. There are different threads on here where people have done something similar and gotten a full season of egg laying out of them.

Don't get bogged down in the genetics. Most of the genetic talk on here is about feather color/pattern or other appearance traits like comb. I don't think that is a concern of yours at all. There is no one gene pair that controls whether you get a plump broiler chicken or a scrawny dual purpose bird. There are a tremendous number of gene pairs that determine the birds conformation, food to meat conversion ratio, how fast they mature, and all the other traits you are looking for. The offspring will inherit genetics from both parents. They should be somewhere in between their parents.

Where genetics will come into play is when you decide which offspring to keep for your breeding program if you go that route instead of bringing in new broiler pullets to breed with your koek-koek roosters. There are a lot of different ways you could go with your breeding program. When you breed crosses even to pure breeds you can get a pretty wide range in the offspring. A general rule is eat the ones you don't want to eat and breed the ones you would rather eat.

Good luck, it should be an interesting journey.

Free range with some supplementing with a feed but no hormones. Here hormones are added to all feed so I will be mixing my own. Also meal worms and red wrigglers as treats and they'll have access to the compost heap and lots of fresh veg waste from the veg garden.

 

[PTA Chicks]

https://www.freedomrangerhatchery.com I would suggest this hatchery if you want good genetics to start with trying to breed an ideal meat bird for your situation. Some of these might already be exactly what you are looking for. They do not have Cornish X but you can get those from most hatcheries already. I have never ordered from this hatchery but I may get Some New Hampshires and Delawares from them in the future since its they only hatchery I know of that selectively breeds both of them for meat qualities. Their alternative Broilers may be ideal for what you are looking for. Get 2 different types of Their broilers and breed them together for even more Hybrid Vigor. I am just playing around with what I have gotten locally and I doubt I ever make that ultimate sustainable homestead meat bird. I really only have chickens for their manure and since i have them might as well play around with breeding and learns something new.

I'm not in the USA. The only broilers I can find local to me (can't easily ship poultry here) are big white fat birds. They're called Cobb or Ross and I don't really know the difference between them..it's something I am still reading up. Koek-koeks are a bit pricey to buy and raise soley as meat birds because they do grow fairly slowly. Hence my thinking to raise mixed. And only because I don't want to worry about keeping a broiler rooster away from my layers since I can't easily keep them separate for now. Fencing is just too expensive.

 

[EggWalrus]

I have had Red Ranger girls that made excellent layers even if they were Meaties. I've even hatched off their eggs when they were bred by Rhodies, Leghorns and Games. The Rhodie/Ranger offspring made a nice large carcass with med/large light brown eggs. The Lehorn/Rangers were a good size meat bird with huge jumbo cream colored eggs. The Game/Rangers were smaller than the Mommas as far as body size and layed a few small tinted eggs when they weren't broody, which they stayed broody.
Out of the 3 crosses, I would go with the Leghorn Ranger cross because as far as dual purpose goes, you only get one carcass to eat, but with the Leghorn in it, you get tons of huge monster eggs till its time to resort to eating the carcass. IMO, for the same amount of feed, you'll get a lot more meals from eating the eggs over two years, then eat the carcass, than you would growing out and eating a few carcasses with no eggs. That's dual purpose for you.

 

[Ridgerunner]

I'm not in the USA. The only broilers I can find local to me (can't easily ship poultry here) are big white fat birds. They're called Cobb or Ross and I don't really know the difference between them..it's something I am still reading up. Koek-koeks are a bit pricey to buy and raise soley as meat birds because they do grow fairly slowly. Hence my thinking to raise mixed. And only because I don't want to worry about keeping a broiler rooster away from my layers since I can't easily keep them separate for now. Fencing is just too expensive.

Cobb and Ross are strains of Cornish Cross broilers. Different companies have developed their own version of the Cornish cross just like different companies have developed their own version of the hybrid egg layers. There is an active thread on the forum where someone is raising both strains to compare the two.

What color eggs do the koek-koek lay? With Barred Rock and Black Australorp in their background I'd suspect brown but the also have leghorn in the mix so white is possible. It depends on what the person that developed the breed wanted. Maybe people in South Africa prefer white eggs, I don't know. Have you determined how you will know which eggs to hatch, which are koek-koek and which are Cornish X? Don't expect the Cornish X to go broody. You'll probably have to use a broody koek-koek or use an incubator.

 

[PTA Chicks]

Cobb and Ross are strains of Cornish Cross broilers. Different companies have developed their own version of the Cornish cross just like different companies have developed their own version of the hybrid egg layers. There is an active thread on the forum where someone is raising both strains to compare the two.

What color eggs do the koek-koek lay? With Barred Rock and Black Australorp in their background I'd suspect brown but the also have leghorn in the mix so white is possible. It depends on what the person that developed the breed wanted. Maybe people in South Africa prefer white eggs, I don't know. Have you determined how you will know which eggs to hatch, which are koek-koek and which are Cornish X? Don't expect the Cornish X to go broody. You'll probably have to use a broody koek-koek or use an incubator.

Brown eggs. White eggs are not common (unless they're candy covered chocolate ones!)

Not sure yet,haven't finished thinking everything through. I was also introduced to Zulu chickens who are apparently quite broody and very hardy so that's also an option. They're just very skinny things,not good for meat but good layers. Still got a few months to figure things out. It is still warm here till April/May then only gets just a little bit chilly.
I just want to be able to bypass the whole incubator or buying 1 days olds thing. My husbsnd isn't keen for babies in the house.

 

[Ridgerunner]

There are always details to these things. Making the basic decision is one thing but then you have to figure out how. Keeping a specific breed for hatching purposes only is one model some people use to avoid incubators. I understand why, I much prefer a broody hen do all the work for me and my hens go broody a lot. But for various reasons, mainly limited freezer space, I need to butcher pretty much all year long. My broody hens don't go broody when I need them to so I can avoid running out of meat.

I use an incubator to hatch in winter, January or February for me. It can get well below freezing. As I have electricity in the coop I do not brood in the house. My wife would divorce me if I tried plus I would not enjoy it either. It is so much easier for me to brood outside when it comes to cleaning but there are challenges too, mainly to do with large temperature swings. If you want to chat about how to set up a brooder outside let me know. There are many different ways to set them up. This is a shot of my brooder in late spring after the danger of severe cold has passed.

 

[PTA Chicks]

There are always details to these things. Making the basic decision is one thing but then you have to figure out how. Keeping a specific breed for hatching purposes only is one model some people use to avoid incubators. I understand why, I much prefer a broody hen do all the work for me and my hens go broody a lot. But for various reasons, mainly limited freezer space, I need to butcher pretty much all year long. My broody hens don't go broody when I need them to so I can avoid running out of meat.

I use an incubator to hatch in winter, January or February for me. It can get well below freezing. As I have electricity in the coop I do not brood in the house. My wife would divorce me if I tried plus I would not enjoy it either. It is so much easier for me to brood outside when it comes to cleaning but there are challenges too, mainly to do with large temperature swings. If you want to chat about how to set up a brooder outside let me know. There are many different ways to set them up. This is a shot of my brooder in late spring after the danger of severe cold has passed.

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Thanks for this. I didn't think about making an outdoor broiler area. I'm going to bookmark this and get back to it in a bit.