Chicken too thin!

[Sabz]

Good info Lyliput, thanks.

Additionnaly, I found this:

Its fairly easy to tell, actually. Hold your chicken like a football in one hand. You'll feel the keel of their breastbone. If the muscle rising off either side of the keel is deep and convex (SABZ NOTE:I think here he means Concave, curving outwards), your bird is in excellent condition. If the muscle is convex, meaning it curves inward, you have a bird that is not putting on muscle for some reason. A thorough inspection of the bird should then give you information as to the issue at hand: empty or sparsely filled crop, mites, etc.

And this:

" You are feeling for her “keel,” the bone which separates the breasts. If you have ever carved a chicken, this is the bone that sticks straight up when carving, which you scrape the breast meat off.
Gently feel through the feathers for this bone. If it is sharp and prominent, if you can pinch it between your fingers without feeling any meat, then your chicken is underweight. On the other hand if you feel cleavage, then your chicken is overweight"

On mine, I can feel the bone. I will check if I feel a muscle besides it, and if the muscle curves inwards or outwards.

 

[KeepOnClucking]

I had a similar problem a while back with a couple of my chickens and switched them back from a layer feed to a grower and they bulked up fast. I separately supplemented with oyster shells for those that wanted to eat it, so they would be getting enough calcium.

 

[debp]

Is this method of convex vs. concave true of 11-week old chicks, too?

 

[donrae]

Posting pictures of a rooster carcass below. Some may consider it graphic as this isn't the meat bird section.



I dare say most vets don't know what a growing pullet's breast feels like

. Just cause they're a vet doesn't mean they know birds. I'll bet they still have a picture in their minds of grocery store cornish crosses, with their big huge breasts. A non-CX bird has no need to have such a large breast muscle, it serves the bird no purpose. All my layers' keel bones can be easily felt. I don't weigh my birds, but I go by how they look. My birds are healthy, active, glossy feathered and productive, therefore they must be getting enough to eat. Birds with poor nutrition are going to have dull feathers that break easily, get sick more often, be susceptible to parasites, and not lay eggs. If you don't have those issues, your birds are fine. I've been keeping birds 20 years and never had a bird die of starvation. I keep feed available 24/7, one feeder for over 2 dozen birds. It's completely normal in the animal world for the dominant animals to eat first. Animals I feed at set times a day, like my horses and dogs, get fed in different locations so the beta animal gets it's share. Animals that have feed available all the time (chickens) just have one feeder. The beta manages to get in there and eat enough to stay healthy and productive.


As far as the bird's keel bone, here's some food for thought. The pictures below are of carcasses of 8ish month old roosters. So, full grown. They were a mix of dual purpose breeds. Look at the breast and the angle of the keel and think how that would have felt when holding the bird. That keel would still have felt prominent, especially if you have a CX body shape in mind. Trust me, these were large, healthy looking roosters with plenty of feed in them!

 

[Sabz]

Thanks Donrae, this is useful info. I think what I feel on my hens is probably similar to the images you have posted.

May I ask some unrelated questions on this topic? I was just wondering what was the yellow on the first image? Fat?! I would think of the fat being more white, so I was curious

Your chicken looks darker (I mean the meat) than what we see in the grocery store. Is that because it ate a different diet and maybe is fresher, or it is because it is a different breed?

Sorry about those off topic questions, I am still very beginner with chickens and so curious about everything! hehe I don't think one day went by since having my chickens without a new question popping up in my head

 

[donrae]

Hey, ask away, right? That's what this board is all for!

Yep, that yellow is fat. Not sure why it's yellower than store birds. I feed my birds an all-in-one ration, plus table and garden scraps, and when the mood strikes me I buy corn or scratch to treat them with. Actually, thinking back....I was in the hospital and/or otherwise unable to care for my flock most of those bird's lives, and the folks who were caring for them fed half feed and half cracked corn. So, the increased corn in the diet could have colored the fat yellow? Didn't think of that until just now, but I could believe that. I've known some folks who finish their birds on corn to get a nice fat pad on the back above the tail.

We skin our birds instead of plucking them, so that's a little of the color difference. But, most of what you're seeing is active muscle that's been used and developed, as opposed to a grocery store chicken. CX (Cornish cross) in the grocery store are a max of 8 weeks old when they're processed, and they've been raised to have about a square foot of space each. Their muscles are baby muscles, never really used for much. It's like the difference between veal and steak, pretty much. Older birds have some tooth to the meat, and you usually don't cook it quite the same as a store chicken. Great-Grandma didn't have any recipes for boneless skinless chicken breasts, did she? Nope, it was chicken and dumplings, fried chicken (very young cockerels), chicken and noodles, things like that. The CX has been bred in direct response to consumer demand for all that breast meat. I remember growing up kids fighting over the legs and even the back, cause those parts have the most flavor

. We didn't know they were supposed to be icky

 

[Sabz]

OH! I never heard about skinning instead of plucking. This is very interesting. I am some sort of passionate person, I guess.. and for my first try even I have 20 meat chicks I am kind of fearing the processing day - not for the moral side, but more for the time it will take to pluck all of those. Probably will take more than one day.

I will go on to read about skinning. I am on weight watchers, so no skin is a lot better for me

Good explanations for the yellow fat and meat color. It makes a lot of sense, I didn't think of comparing with veal/steak. I am eager to see the meat of mine. They will be babies, but they are getting a lot of exercise outside in the run, I suppose they will look different from the birds raised in a single square foot! Wow.. that is so little. Mine have 3,6 square foot each inside the coop (but I also have about 10 extra square foot if they go up the ladder). Outside in the run, they have about 6.5 square foot each (I let them in the run with my 5 layers, if I let them out alone they have 8 square foot each!). If I am gardening I will take the layers out with me on the lawn, so the babies usually have a lot more space.

I just LOVE this hobby. Will never stop I love to take care of them, learn about behaviors, medical stuff, anatomy, planting a garden just for them, planning, eating my own meat and eggs. I am so glad I found this forum. It had changed my day to day life a lot, in a healthier and more human way! I really dislike the fact that (most) grocery chicken is caged in those really small cages for all their life.

 

[Lilyput]

Posting pictures of a rooster carcass below. Some may consider it graphic as this isn't the meat bird section.



I dare say most vets don't know what a growing pullet's breast feels like

. Just cause they're a vet doesn't mean they know birds. I'll bet they still have a picture in their minds of grocery store cornish crosses, with their big huge breasts. A non-CX bird has no need to have such a large breast muscle, it serves the bird no purpose. All my layers' keel bones can be easily felt. I don't weigh my birds, but I go by how they look. My birds are healthy, active, glossy feathered and productive, therefore they must be getting enough to eat. Birds with poor nutrition are going to have dull feathers that break easily, get sick more often, be susceptible to parasites, and not lay eggs. If you don't have those issues, your birds are fine. I've been keeping birds 20 years and never had a bird die of starvation. I keep feed available 24/7, one feeder for over 2 dozen birds. It's completely normal in the animal world for the dominant animals to eat first. Animals I feed at set times a day, like my horses and dogs, get fed in different locations so the beta animal gets it's share. Animals that have feed available all the time (chickens) just have one feeder. The beta manages to get in there and eat enough to stay healthy and productive.


As far as the bird's keel bone, here's some food for thought. The pictures below are of carcasses of 8ish month old roosters. So, full grown. They were a mix of dual purpose breeds. Look at the breast and the angle of the keel and think how that would have felt when holding the bird. That keel would still have felt prominent, especially if you have a CX body shape in mind. Trust me, these were large, healthy looking roosters with plenty of feed in them!

Dear DonRae, this was simply fabulous and so helpful. Thanks so much. What red wine in the background are you pairing with the bird? LOL

 

[donrae]

Dear DonRae, this was simply fabulous and so helpful. Thanks so much. What red wine in the background are you pairing with the bird? LOL

Your welcome! I know folks worry about their birds all the time, but again most folks don't realize what a healthy production bird should look like.

And about that wine...I know this is going to make the wine folks cringe, but I don't drink wine at all. Not a bit, and I know nothing about wine except I like the flavor sometimes when I cook. So, I go to Wal-Mart

, find a bottle that happens to appeal to me

and stick it in my cart. Usually in the $3-5 a bottle range

. If I recognize a label from a food blog I've read, I'm likely to get that brand. If not, I just pretty much go by what name sounds appealing to however I feel at the time. I know, I know, some folks are having a stroke reading this!

We processed 4 roosters that day. We didn't rest them or anything. They were slaughtered, skinned, gutted and in the pressure cooker. I put onion, celery, carrot and some wine in the pressure cooker and locked it down. Cooked the bird (whole) for about 40 min. Rapid cooled, pulled the bird out and the guys pretty much had the next one ready to go. I didn't change out the broth at all, used the same liquid to cook all 4 birds. By the end of the day I had the most wonderful broth! Thick, flavorful, really great stuff. Strained it and froze it into ice cube trays.

 

[Lilyput]

Sounds delicious. By the way what are your dogs? They look like great hunters; I have Giant Schnauzers.