Dark Cornish and White Rock cross. (meat project)

[DuckBoy]

not at all more like 2 weeks. but reg cornish dont grow at the same rate

 

[kauaifeerange]

Cool info

 

[DuckBoy]

OK guys and gals my Dark Cornish and White Rock/ Amberlink cross chicks are 3 weeks old and I thought I would give you an update. I don't have scales to weigh them but I had my daughter hold some for comparison, I have not lost any of them, all though I had 2 that I had to keep in the house for the first week and give them scrambled eggs and some vitamins to help them get over the hump so to speak, they are smaller than the rest of them but they are doing fine and growing. So far I am happy as I think for the most part the growth rate is what I expected, most of them have the big legs of the Dark Cornish so I am hopeful they will have the double breast as well, time will tell. OK tell me what ya'll think, here are the pic's....



Pic # 1 All the light colored birds are the Dark Cornish and Amberlink Cross. Pic # 2 All the dark colored birds are the Dark Cornish and White Rock cross.

Do you have any updates?

 

[Jerry C]

Sorry it took so long guys been busy as hell but anyways here are my results after 8 months, I had to keep the roosters separated because they would gang up on one and keep him beat down and away from the feed ended up with 3 separate pins of roosters because of this. The hens where fine and started laying at only a little over 4 months but they did not have the body mass that the roosters did, they are like regular egg layers and that's what i use them for. Here are some pic's of the biggest roosters and the meanest ones, notice the hens in the side pen.

Here are some pic's after butcher, they averaged 6lbs dressed, I don't think I will be doing this again not because of the feed,all though it was costly they had stater available 24/7 and also feed them fermented scratch. But the constant fighting was just to much to deal with. I am happy with the rooster body development with a nice Brest ( Brest was not as big as the Cornish x but didn't miss it by much ) and big leg quarters, all in all i am very happy with the results of the roosters but the hens where a bit of a disappointment body wise, but they are very good egg layers and lay a big egg, was getting 14 eggs a day out of 16 new hens, before the time changed. The eggs did start out small but know they are large with some double yorker's, added a light and a timer and they are back to production now, they get 14 hours of light a day. In my opinion it is not worth it just to get roosters for butcher as the hens did not meat the standard for body mass that i was hopping for. I made some home made from chicken and dumplings and they were out of this world. I hope this helps answer some your questions.

 

[DuckBoy]

they look good and thanks for the comments. I will be doing a dark cornish/ white rock cross in the spring.

 

[ftpagain]

i am trying to get the same project going. can you share some more details? how did you pick out your breeding stock? i might have missed it but did you have roosters as cornish or hens? did you butcher them at 8 months? would they be a lot smaller if you butchered them earlier? would it make any difference if it was rock roos with cornish hens vs cornish roos and rock hens? also if the crosses were to breed what would happen? sorry i know a whole lot of nothing about genetic, i just want some good and healthy meat birds
THANK YOU

 

[B&G Eisenbeis]

This was not my project but if you are going to cross and hatch your own, you are going to want the rocks as the female because they lay more eggs than a Cornish meaning more chicks.

 

[B&G Eisenbeis]

I am really wanting to do this but agree it does not seem like it would be reasonable to do if you were going to sell chicken meat

 

[Irishchikn]

Sorry it took so long guys been busy as hell but anyways here are my results after 8 months, I had to keep the roosters separated because they would gang up on one and keep him beat down and away from the feed ended up with 3 separate pins of roosters because of this. The hens where fine and started laying at only a little over 4 months but they did not have the body mass that the roosters did, they are like regular egg layers and that's what i use them for. Here are some pic's of the biggest roosters and the meanest ones, notice the hens in the side pen.

Here are some pic's after butcher, they averaged 6lbs dressed, I don't think I will be doing this again not because of the feed,all though it was costly they had stater available 24/7 and also feed them fermented scratch. But the constant fighting was just to much to deal with. I am happy with the rooster body development with a nice Brest ( Brest was not as big as the Cornish x but didn't miss it by much ) and big leg quarters, all in all i am very happy with the results of the roosters but the hens where a bit of a disappointment body wise, but they are very good egg layers and lay a big egg, was getting 14 eggs a day out of 16 new hens, before the time changed. The eggs did start out small but know they are large with some double yorker's, added a light and a timer and they are back to production now, they get 14 hours of light a day. In my opinion it is not worth it just to get roosters for butcher as the hens did not meat the standard for body mass that i was hopping for. I made some home made from chicken and dumplings and they were out of this world. I hope this helps answer some your questions.

wow, that cross sure did make some pretty roosters. Maybe you should try a tie cord that they use for gamefowl. You can keep the roosters staked out of range of each other. That would also save the hens from too much unwanted harassment

 

[trescloudy]

I couldn't agree more although mine are not free range, to many predators around here for that. I want to have a self sustaining flock, call me crazy.

Love these kinds of threads. Keep on it, I think it will pan out.