Cornish hens

[Titus2Woman]

After my husband and I talked we are thinking of doing cornish hens for meat. NOT cornish x. So I am trying to figure out what to get. I see dark cornish on Meyer's site. I assume that this is what I would want to get. These are the little hens in the store right? How long do these take to mature for the table and freezer?

 

[al6517]

No they are not............... Hatchery sourced cornish are not used as the grocery store cornish hen. A grocery store Cornish hen is a cornish X that is only allowed to grow for 3-4 weeks then processed into what you see in the freezer isle. Hatchery Cornish will offer little more than disappointment if you want them for the freezer, they mature slowly and don't get to any decent size as the hatcheries have crossed them with so many other birds to improve egg laying in the hatcheries favor. In short Hatchery cornish will take longer to mature to size and will be small and scrawney.

 

[rodriguezpoultry]

Al has it spot on.

 

[Titus2Woman]

Thanks for clearing that up for me! I will have to discuss it with my husband. Out of curiosity, do roosters crow that early? I am not allowed to have roosters but if I were to process them at 3-4 weeks would anyone know I had roosters?

 

[Illia]

Roosters don't typically crow until they're at least 4 months old.


If you're doing Cornish X meaties you'll never hear a crow out of them.

 

[al6517]

Quote:
X2 they won't live long enough to crow.... Illia is right. Even when I grew my Cornish X to well over laying age for a breeding project the rooster almost never crowed.

 

[Tracydr]

If you do Cornish X, you can always order all Pullets. You could also try the red broilers from Ideal or the Kosher Kings, although I think they are only straight run and since you keep them until about 12 weeks, your risk of crowing goes up. Same with Freedom Rangers, or whatever they're calling them now, from JM Hatchery.