First Run of Cornish Cross Meat Birds and Super Excited!

[denn1948]

I really enjoy this thread . Jessica, when you started this thread you made it interesting with pictures and videos. And more people started raising CX's. Great job. I see MaryB on other threads I subscribe to.Th's is A relaxing thread, instead of being so uptight about breeding great birds. HOOVER HATCHERY sells CX's as low as $1.10 per bird.

 

[duluthralphie]

I really enjoy this thread . Jessica, when you started this thread you made it interesting with pictures and videos. And more people started raising CX's. Great job. I see MaryB on other threads I subscribe to.Th's is A relaxing thread, instead of being so uptight about breeding great birds. HOOVER HATCHERY sells CX's as low as $1.10 per bird.

I got my Babies from Hoover hatchery and they are fantastic little guys....


On that note, it appears the chicken gods are conspiring to keep my CX's around a while longer. I ordered small turkey bags from Nadya's for my CX's.

Nadya sent me the last order with no problems. Because the turkey bags are not on the pull down menu I had to send them an order request and they invoiced me. My order had my address on it. I then paid for the bags with paypal.
challenges
Little did I know Paypal had my address as being in Florida still. Nadya sent the bags to that address..... oh well, stuff happens...


It took me 2 hours to change the address on paypal so that does not happen again. Being technologically challenged has it own punishments....

I am not sure when I will get the bags now. Or if I have to order them again. If I do not get them soon, I will need to order the medium size turkey bags instead of the small ones.



On another note, I went out to check on my CX's yesterday and not one bird was around. I have a pen their brooder is in. I open the brooder door and leave the pen gate open so they can free range. They were ALL missing.


I found a half a dozen in one of my machine sheds resting under my boat. I found a few scattered through the woods, and others were just gone........


At bedtime last night I had one on the wrong side of the fence opposite the gate to the pen. The poor baby was distressed seeing feed going to everyone else and her not getting any.

My wife was out their so I asked her to catch it and hand it to me. The CX vetoed that plan. She chased the poor waddling bird for 5 minutes before she caught it. The cx of course refused to go the direction we wanted it too. Finally she cornered it and handed it to me. I was afraid she was going to drop it when she reached over the fence. Luckily she did not and I took it to it's brooder and food. It was happy then.

I am sure had she dropped from 4 ft she would have broke her little legs. There is no way they could absorb all that weight......

 

[Double Kindness]

Well, I guess I'm trying to make coq au vin today with that 1 year old 7.3 lb white star rooster we processed last weekend. It has been marinading in a 1.5 liter bottle of Rex - Goliath cabernet sauvignon wine for 36 hours.

And we have 6 roos in the coop waiting for my bf to wake up so we can start- ie: finish caponizing. There's a speckled sussex roo that sets my nerves off. He screams when he crows, which sets off all the other roosters. Other roosters numbering 22 btw. Agh.

 

[JessicaThistle]

I really enjoy this thread . Jessica, when you started this thread you made it interesting with pictures and videos. And more people started raising CX's. Great job. I see MaryB on other threads I subscribe to.Th's is A relaxing thread, instead of being so uptight about breeding great birds. HOOVER HATCHERY sells CX's as low as $1.10 per bird.

Thank you and welcome to the thread! Before I started this thread, i think I read every thread there was on BYC. It seemed that I was finding more opinions and, ahem, arguments, than I was finding the information that I was looking for. I didn't want opinions and arguments. I wanted to share my experience in a positive way so that others would learn from my experience and I could learn from them as well. I also wanted there to be some hope that raising Cornish Cross could be a great experience! I truly believe that we have all learned that along these 76 pages of chicken talk.

Even better though, I think that we have made a thread where people come to each day because they feel like we are friends here. I love that. Like Linda said a couple of days ago: "This thread is like Cheers, where everybody knows your name." Lol! I think this is the best thread because all of you make it so awesome!!

 

[denn1948]

I'll be here lurking lol. Dennis

 

[duluthralphie]

A crappy day in Minnesota. Weather was beautiful, perfect for an eagle to attack!


I lost one of my baby turkeys from the Sept hatch. I thought I would lose all the babies from such a late hatch, but I thought it would be to weather. I lost a little slate red tom. I have a slate blue hen left from the hatch of 5, that is all. The eagle got into a fight with the turkeys, one of this springs hens is hurting. she had a mess of feathers pulled out and a gouge on the side of her neck/head. I doubt she will live.

She was so scared today she actually crawled into the CX's brooder/tractor twice! The first time I got her out I did not notice the wound. When she was out I saw her standing hunched over and looking hurt with blood and tissue hanging off her neck. These young eagles are really doing a number on me lately. The turkey most have fought back some, as I found a eagle feather on the ground with the turkey feathers. What really stinks is I had to throw the feather away as they are illegal to have.


My wife and I finished the run on our 9ft by 75 ft run off our coop. I have no birds outside and none free ranging for a few days now. I am just sick over this. If not for the huge fine and my allergy to jail cells, that eagle would be dead!

Enough ranting vodka time.

 

[Morrigan]

Thank you and welcome to the thread! Before I started this thread, i think I read every thread there was on BYC. It seemed that I was finding more opinions and, ahem, arguments, than I was finding the information that I was looking for. I didn't want opinions and arguments. I wanted to share my experience in a positive way so that others would learn from my experience and I could learn from them as well. I also wanted there to be some hope that raising Cornish Cross could be a great experience! I truly believe that we have all learned that along these 76 pages of chicken talk.

Even better though, I think that we have made a thread where people come to each day because they feel like we are friends here. I love that. Like Linda said a couple of days ago: "This thread is like Cheers, where everybody knows your name." Lol! I think this is the best thread because all of you make it so awesome!!

And, I really, really thank you for this. I read so many threads and blogs that made it sound like raising cornish cross chickens was a gross, horrible thing. I appreciate you for sharing with us that it is possible to raise these birds with love, humor and care, and still be able to find the strength to process them at the end. It made me look forward to raising them, and so far I've been enjoying my little meatballs. Your experience made me realize that to make their lives, and ultimate sacrifice, as humane as possible, I need to give myself over to joys inherent in caring for them.

 

[JessicaThistle]

A crappy day in Minnesota. Weather was beautiful, perfect for an eagle to attack!


I lost one of my baby turkeys from the Sept hatch. I thought I would lose all the babies from such a late hatch, but I thought it would be to weather. I lost a little slate red tom. I have a slate blue hen left from the hatch of 5, that is all. The eagle got into a fight with the turkeys, one of this springs hens is hurting. she had a mess of feathers pulled out and a gouge on the side of her neck/head. I doubt she will live.

She was so scared today she actually crawled into the CX's brooder/tractor twice! The first time I got her out I did not notice the wound. When she was out I saw her standing hunched over and looking hurt with blood and tissue hanging off her neck. These young eagles are really doing a number on me lately. The turkey most have fought back some, as I found a eagle feather on the ground with the turkey feathers. What really stinks is I had to throw the feather away as they are illegal to have.


My wife and I finished the run on our 9ft by 75 ft run off our coop. I have no birds outside and none free ranging for a few days now. I am just sick over this. If not for the huge fine and my allergy to jail cells, that eagle would be dead!

Enough ranting vodka time.

I'm sorry so Ralphie!! Is the turkey big enough to just process to avoid the possible?

I'm glad that you got your run finished. It's too bad that your birds can't just be free to roam. Some circles of people would say that things are only illegal if you get caught. This is what I hear anyway as I am just a person who is allergic to finding out if I am actually allergic to jail and therefore have a clean record. Plus, I have a tendency to shoot the target below the belt instead of in the heart, thus taking the paper man out of the gene pool. Therefore, if I tried to shoot anything in my yard (with my luck) I would most likely accidentally shoot one of my neighbor's well-insured horses and the eagle would become the least of my problems. Haha! Yes, feel free to laugh. The target really was removed from the gene pool and my instructor had a good laugh about it.

And, I really, really thank you for this. I read so many threads and blogs that made it sound like raising cornish cross chickens was a gross, horrible thing. I appreciate you for sharing with us that it is possible to raise these birds with love, humor and care, and still be able to find the strength to process them at the end. It made me look forward to raising them, and so far I've been enjoying my little meatballs. Your experience made me realize that to make their lives, and ultimate sacrifice, as humane as possible, I need to give myself over to joys inherent in caring for them.

YES! My goal is accomplished.

You nailed exactly the reason that I started the thread. Even though I only knew what I had read, I was determined to prove the status quo wrong. If anyone considering raising CX reads this thread, I am positive that we have all proved that these are awesome birds when raised correctly. I planned that if I failed, I was going to share the my truth about these birds and accept failure. I expected failure because of the threads that I had read, but I believe that I won! Not only did I raise healthy, happy Cornish X chickens and make it through processing....for two batches. I encouraged, learned from, and went through this with all of you who are also raising happy, healthy Cornish X chickens. How awesome is that!!!

By the way, has anyone heard from PlaidBattleAxe?? I haven't seen her in awhile and sure hope she comes back here!

 

[duluthralphie]

Jessica, I just looked at Plaids profile, she has not been on in three weeks!

Hopefully everything is okay.

I really do not want to process the turkey. I will take my chances on her surviving. She is one of three hens I have from the spring for next years hatch. Do you know if I breed a slate blue hen to a slate blue tom will I still get a frog?


I have the injured hen in the chicken coop, separated from the chickens, in the ICU area with a heat lamp over her. I doubt the heat lamp is needed, but I thought she might want the extra warmth if she gets a fever and to comfort her. I am thinking of putting Ethel and her last remaining baby in the ICU with her for company. It is going to be so different not having all my birds running around the yard, greeting and following me everywhere I go.

I am going to let my CX's out again today. I know they could be taken by the evil incarnate eagle, but they seem to do a real good job of hiding. I would park my truck near them but I doubt they could fit under it, they are so big. (a joke)

Last night when I put them to bed they all come running like always but this time one of them decided he had to perch on a 1x12 I have sitting along side the brooder (narrow edge down and up) It was so funny as he tried to perch on the 1x12 he is so big and not all that coordinated. He did do a fair job of sitting on it before jumping down and going into the brooder. The funny thing was every CX that followed him tried sitting on the same 1x12 for a few seconds. It must have been a CX challenge. None of the others did as well as he did. The last one was a fairly large hen, she jumped up on the board. flapped her wings to get her balance. Put her wings by her side as if to show the world she could do it. And fell head first onto the ground!

It gave me a laugh after the sh*^^y day I had had.

Yesterday morning, I had to lift my tractor because one of the bigger roosters seemed to be stuck in the tractor and I thought he was too big to get through the even enlarged door. He played me!

Last night he had no trouble going into the tractor for food!


I like all my birds but I really think the CX's are my favorite, their personalities are just so sweet.

I do not know if any of you have keep yours long enough to see them try to establish a pecking order. That is fun to watch also, unlike the other birds the CX's bump chest and finish the ritual in about .00000003 seconds. They are so gentle it appears they are ashamed to actually fight for position. ( having 25 lb CX's does give one a different prospective.) *


















* a poetic license invoked

 

[Double Kindness]

Oh ralphie, your posts made me cry, then laugh! I'm pretty sure if you cross a blue slate with a blue slate, you will get- blue slate lol.

We had frost on the ground this morning. I have got to get 2 rabbit grow out hutches built, and the ayam cemani/bresse coop/run built. Winter is coming. We have some friends coming to help us bang it out on Saturday. And we gotta reinforce the predator proofing for all my flocks areas. I can't lose anything to predators.

I think I will order 30 cx from ideal in march, so the meaties area will be ready for spring planting. Freezer camp is not this weekend but the next one. 15 chickens and 6 ducks are slated for freezer camp.