FCR for Cornish Cross

[Dennis1979]

Pardon me if this has been discussed before, but can someone tell me the feed conversion ratio for a cornish cross on pasture. Also, what is the conversion of live weight to dressed weight. I'm new and gathering info. Sorry if these are dumb questions.

Dennis

 

[greyfields]

Quote:
The FCR's for each different strain will be slightly different (the catalog from Cobb breeders has like 25 different broilers in it, so you never really know which alphanumeric strain you are getting)... but in general, they go something like:

At 2 weeks of age, FCR ~ 1.2
At 6 weeks of age, FCR ~ 1.8
At 8 weeks, it leaps up over 2.0, then start going up exponentially

Dressed weight is roughly 2/3 live weight.

 

[Dennis1979]

Thanks Greyfields.

I saw on another thread you mentioned the Red Broiler "Red Bro". I understand that the Red Bro should have fewer health issues than the Cornish Cross and may be somewhat smaller in size than the CC. Can you tell me how much smaller (i.e. dressed out) and what are the other pros and cons of the Red Bro over the CC.

Dennis

 

[greyfields]

Quote:
They are more vigorous birds. In the EU, organic birds must be 81 days old before processing. Can you imagine a CX at 81 days? You can't because they would be mostly dead!

So, they grow more slowly and by doing so, they are able to breed disease resistance and vigor into them, rather than the "growth above all else" breeding programs for CX's.

They are only smaller in the sense that if you put birds of identical age next to eachother, the CX would be larger at any given age. BUT, the FCR is no different between the two... so the CX is eating more food more quickly... the RedBro is eating an identical amount of feed to reach an identical weight, just in a longer duration.

So, they cost you no more to raise... and are probably cheaper if you count mortality into the equation.

They will dress out the same as a CX would of the same weight. You're just using a longer crop duration to buy yourself more interesting birds to raise.