Heritage Large Fowl - Phase II

[gjensen]

I got game bird feed and the calf manna today. It was $50

. I'm not concerned it's not like I have anything else to spend my money on. Hopefully with the change in diet fertility might pick up a bit. If not, at least everyone will look better. Calf Manna is fed 2 tbs./bird/day, right?

The little bags of calf manna is what you want. It takes a lot of birds to go through the big bags before it goes bad.

What you want to feed is a more nutrient dense feed during the breeding season. You want the protein % up a little, and make sure they are getting all of their vitamins and minerals. What you are preparing for is the chicks. You want the biggest healthiest chicks that you can start with, and the best possible hatch.

Everyone has a slightly different approach. The best you can do is purchase a breeder ration designed specifically for this. Otherwise you can use what you can get, and toy with it to see what you get the best possible results from.

I played around with the whole thing, but the best I have done was buy a breeder ration. I likes Southern States Super Breeder (for gamebirds). I had exceptionally good hatches and chicks. I have not been able to do any better myself.

What kind of game bird feed did you get?

 

[Apdeb]

So if im feeding a 23 percent protein should i up it to 28 for breeding???

 

[hellbender]

This will be my last post on the subject of 'feeding for virility'.

If one is taking the approach of boosting protein to meet the objective, I'd not consider the overall amount of protein to be as important as the source and quality of protein.

I'm Done with this.....

 

[3riverschick]

Quote:
Thanks so much for sharing, hellbender!

This kind of information is so helpful! Even if some of us don't have the facilities
to do all you doing in crafting superior home feed, we can use parts of the info and grow into it as we acquire more equipment.
Best Regards,
Karen

 

[3riverschick]

Lmao ^^

Go ahead, laugh your heads off all of you. Have your fun.

I don't gang up on your breeds.
It's an import. We don't have any lines like this in the US. No bird is perfect but there is a
lot of virtue to work with here. They are only 6 mos. old. That cockerel will settle his chassis down
on his legs. We want to see them leggy at this age ( per Sharpe, "The Book Of The Sussex").
Best,
Karen

 

[3riverschick]

Sussex mating advice from Leo Outram, arguably the greatest of all Sussex breeders. 1925. "The Sussex Fowl" Pages 45 and 46, "Champions mated to champions do not often produce progeny better, or even as good as themselves, they with far greater certainty are inclined to breed a flock of "duds", unless they have been mated according to the blood that is in them; in other words, unless their family history has been carefully considered. On the other hand, imperfection mated correctly to imperfection is the origin of many a prize-winner of to-day. But birds with the same faults should not be mated together.
Type mated to type will produce type, but perfection of color on both the male and female side does not always produce perfection in this respect. It all depends if the color is from an old well-established fountain or not.
A strain of many years' unbroken ancestry is one of the keynotes to a breeders success." ( italics are Outram's)

-----------------------
William White Broomhead "The Light Sussex", Pages 9 and 10 :"The Standard insists on a " long and deep breast-bone." Length of breast-bone (or keel) is desirable in a table fowl, but not in a layer. Too long a keel leaves little capacity for egg-production; hence the novice will be well advised not to take length into consideration to much extent. The length is better in the back, on top so to speak, than in the actual keel bone."
" Then there are head points. The comb should be firm at the base, and erect, with fine and smooth skin; the eyes bold and bright, ever on the alert for the worm and the tit-bit; the ear-lobes smooth, and the wattles without any creases or wrinkles. A thick-skulled hen or pullet, with soft " floppy " comb and dull sunken eyes, is never a good layer; she is out of condition and, as a rule, knows she has a liver!"
( William White Broomhead was Club Judge for The Sussex Poultry Club. He went on to become President of the British Poultry Club.).
Best,
Karen

 

[Vamvakas]

Go ahead, laugh your heads off all of you. Have your fun.

I don't gang up on your breeds.
It's an import. We don't have any lines like this in the US. No bird is perfect but there is a
lot of virtue to work with here. They are only 6 mos. old. That cockerel will settle his chassis down
on his legs. We want to see them leggy at this age ( per Outram, 1925).
Best,
Karen

I was laughing at the picture not the bird.

 

[brahmabreeder]

The little bags of calf manna is what you want. It takes a lot of birds to go through the big bags before it goes bad.

What you want to feed is a more nutrient dense feed during the breeding season. You want the protein % up a little, and make sure they are getting all of their vitamins and minerals. What you are preparing for is the chicks. You want the biggest healthiest chicks that you can start with, and the best possible hatch.

Everyone has a slightly different approach. The best you can do is purchase a breeder ration designed specifically for this. Otherwise you can use what you can get, and toy with it to see what you get the best possible results from.

I played around with the whole thing, but the best I have done was buy a breeder ration. I likes Southern States Super Breeder (for gamebirds). I had exceptionally good hatches and chicks. I have not been able to do any better myself.

What kind of game bird feed did you get?

I got pen pals game bird conditioner http://www.admani.com/Game Bird/Game Bird Feed Products.htm . What do you think? http://www.admani.com/Game Bird/Game Bird Feed Products.htm That's their thing on how to feed game birds. I'm assuming the 28% starter they have is too high, but I've been wrong plenty of times before. When do you think the conditioner could be fed to the growing birds? Normally I feed http://www.tractorsupply.com/en/store/dumorreg;-chick-starter-grower-20%-feed-50-lb until they go into the breeder pen (about 8 months oldish). I'm open to any ideas on how to feed the chicks this year.

 

[gjensen]

So if im feeding a 23 percent protein should i up it to 28 for breeding???

NO.

I do not think 23% is necessary.

I was just trying to give BrahmaBreeder an idea of what poultry breeders do during the breeding season, and many for simplicity feed the breeder ration all year round.

The main point is that her layer ration is not designed for hatching eggs. Commercial layer rations are designed for producing eating eggs and not hatching eggs.

Everyone comes to their own preferences. Just base your decisions on results and not opinions. There are plenty of those around to include my own. You will not find any poultry nutritionist on this site. A lot of us think we are.

 

[3riverschick]

--------------------------
Sharpe, "The Book Of The Sussex"
Chapter 25
Selection
Pages 110 and 111;
"The grand art of mating is not to mate for one point only, but, as in the case with poultry, to mate with the object of breeding for several points, and this is what makes the work so interesting, so fascinating and yet so intricate. To breed for one point only is quite a simple matter, and if the pen should only fail in one point the breeder will have very little difficulty in getting his birds right ; but on looking a pen over closely, it generally "pans out" that they are lacking, or weak, on more than one point, and it must always be understood that the faults, as well as the good points, of a bird will be reproduced. And, again, it is difficult to say when the tendency will occur to breed some latent fault of generations back — for I believe these can never be bred out altogether, although only a small percentage of the progeny may show it. It takes time to breed out the faults in a pen — and it cannot be done in one season — and I often say that a breeder does wrong to bring in fresh blood to try and alter a characteristic or fault in his birds, because, although he may get the particular taint out of his flock more quickly by obtaining fresh blood, yet he may overlook a fault in the bought stock, and so breed in something amongst his already nearly perfect flock which will take him years to put right. To sum up the chapter, let me say that if breeders of the Sussex were to mate smaller pens, in many cases they would have better results with regard to special points, such as type, colour, etc. By mating, say, only two hens with a male bird, and selecting these three for certain good qualities, it will be possible to get a fair percentage of typical youngsters, and then, from this generation, to mate again, and so get bred up a larger number to the points required. This system is the right one, and although may, to some, seem a waste of time with a valuable cockerel, will, I know from practical experience, give the best results." Sharpe was the originator of the Light Sussex. He was one of the three great Secretaries of The Sussex Poultry Club in the last century. The other two being Outram and Clem Watson.

Chapter 29
Selection of Young Stock
Pages 126 thru 128 .
https://archive.org/stream/cu31924003091398#page/n185/mode/2up
Very interesting and educational. Note the pagination in archive.org and the book are different. These are page numbers in the book itself. Just one point here from Page 127 which I incorrectly earlier attributed to Leo Outram. "In cockerels more particularly do I like to see them as youngsters rather long in the legs. I always look upon a long-legged awkward-looking cockerel in the "chicken stage" as a promising bird to select, he will "come down," as the term is used, and show good frame and type when growth is completed."