Got 'em! 150 Colored Range Broilers (aka Freedom Rangers)

[YakLady]

Thanks for this thread, UncleHoot. I'm a fellow Michigander, and I've been toying around with the idea of raising some meat birds. Since I don't have any idea of how to begin, I did some reading today, and found this thread. I appreciate the time that you've put into providing detailed information. I look forward to hearing how the story ends, and to seeing pictures of them at their final weight. Good luck!

 

[UncleHoot]

Heart attack. Dead at 11 1/2 weeks.

That bothers me more than it would have with cornish x. But that's the only one that died past the first couple days.

To make things worse, I ran over him when moving the pen this morning. So, I separated him out, but I could tell he wasn't going to be around much longer.

Down to 146/150 now. Two are runts. One is female, so she won't be dinner. I'll be keeping her for eggs. The other guy will be dinner, even if he's only 2 lbs.

 

[UncleHoot]

3600 lbs of feed used to date (almost 12 weeks)

Half of them will only be fed for another day (Tuesday), so I'm expecting my final 400 lbs of feed to last until the other half gets processed the following week.

In addition to the heart attack, I've noticed a couple with "bow legs". They don't seem to get around very well, as their legs are not directly underneath their bodies. But, they can still move around fairly well. But this is one more indication that they should be gone by now.

 

[YakLady]

Hey, U.H., good luck with the processing today. Hope all goes well. I'm looking forward to reading your opinion of the taste of the final product!

 

[UncleHoot]

Loaded them up last night. One girl escaped. I figured I could catch her this morning, but she's too fast, and is pretty scared of me now. She's a big girl, so keeping her as a hen really isn't a good idea.

Anyway, 75 of them were loaded onto the truck and driven 6 miles to the processor. When I got them there, they weren't exactly sure what to think. They had never seen non-white broilers that were that big.

3800 lbs of feed so far. I've got about 70 left in the other pen.

 

[UncleHoot]

I weighed the chickens, bagged. Just like the grocery store says, I'm sure that includes some water weight, but I can't imagine that it amounts to very much. I also round down to the nearest 1/4 pound, unless it's within 0.03 lbs of the next weight, so realistically on average, each chicken probably weighed about 0.12 lbs more.

Ok, so how much did they weigh? Our average was 5.75 lbs. That's 1/4 pound higher than I would have expected, so I'm quite pleased with that.

At this point I can only guess at their feed conversion. Having used 3800 lbs of feed for 146 birds, 75 of which had a dressed weight of 5.75 lbs average, we get
(75/146 X 3800)/(5.75 X 75) = 1952 lbs of feed (est) / 431.25 lbs of chicken = FCR of 4.5 (dressed weight). Multiplying by 2/3 gives us an estimated FCR of 3.0 (live weight).

Of course, this could change a little based on next week's results, but I think 3.0 is probably the magic number here. If we had processed them a week or two ago, it might be 2.8 or 2.9. That's not bad.

Other thoughts:
My processor said something like, "Normally, we get those colored chickens in here and they are a real pain. But these weren't too bad." Even so, he said they were more difficult than a normal cornish cross. I think he said they were harder to pluck, because they were a bit firmer, even than a cornish cross of the same age.

We haven't eaten one yet, but that will probably happen in the next few days.

 

[faykokoWV]

congrats on finishing. Let us know how it tastes!

This thread has been great.

 

[tnchicken]

Curious if you restricted feed like recommended for CX and at what age? I have a 100 chick order from S & G that's 11 days old now that I hope to compare to JM since you have provided such great data.

Thanks again for taking the time to document this.

 

[UncleHoot]

Quote:
I don't restrict feed, even on my cornish x. I might try it on my next batch of cornish x, though, just to see if it would help with the heart attacks (flip). These guys grow slow enough that it's much less of a concern. Even so, one of them still flipped, but I suppose it's bound to happen with any large chicken.

Good luck with the S&G's. I've read mixed reviews on here.

 

[StillwaterCreek]

Quote:
And?

Thanks a bunch for the journal. This has really helped me with feed calculations.

I did my first (and last... ugh) batch of Cornish X's back in the early summer, and am presently 6 weeks into a mixed batch from S&G which includes their Red Rangers, Dixie Rainbows, Johnny Grays and Naked Necks. Also have some of their White Pearl hens which will join our other older layers when the meat birds graduate. Overall, this has been a much better experience than the CX's. Not to mention they're just prettier birds to look at every day...

So far we've lost several, but with the exception of only one or maybe two those have been due to mistakes on my part. Ran over them moving the pasture pen too quickly, kept too many in too small a brooder space and thus a few ended up trampled/suffocated, etc etc. Seems like I always have to learn these lessons the hard way... But learning we are, and certainly enjoying watching them grow and looking forward to sending them off to Freezer Camp!