Heritage Large Fowl - Phase II

[catdaddyfro]

If you lived down here where our seasons consist of Hot, Hotter, Hottest, and Christmas - you would be able see the difference between hatching when it is technically winter versus hatching any other time.

As I posted the other day on another environmental/locale related issue "that everywhere is not the same place" sounds funny but think about it what works here, might not work over there, and may even be dangerous over yonder. Here in the south(US) starting around mid May with temps in the 90s and RH in the 90s chicks or juvie birds will become almost stalemated at growing or gaining like they should or would normally elsewhere. oh most will eventually come on but good grief why go thru this when you can just start a tad earlier and get them up and mostly grown and things go so much smoother that way. And too, I could see just why the opposite (your type) weather would yield different results.

Jeff

 

[Mr MKK FARMS]

Okay I think I get it now.

By the way, good post on the dominant and recessive genes.

 

[fowlman01]

As I posted the other day on another environmental/locale related issue "that everywhere is not the same place" sounds funny but think about it what works here, might not work over there, and may even be dangerous over yonder. Here in the south(US) starting around mid May with temps in the 90s and RH in the 90s chicks or juvie birds will become almost stalemated at growing or gaining like they should or would normally elsewhere. oh most will eventually come on but good grief why go thru this when you can just start a tad earlier and get them up and mostly grown and things go so much smoother that way. And too, I could see just why the opposite (your type) weather would yield different results.

Jeff

No it is not and that is why many times I qualify my advice with "it works here for me the way I manage my flock". I live in a place that is ideal for raising poultry. I am 10 miles from the place that was once called "The egg capitol of the world" (Petaluma CA). Every area and every type of management changes how the birds grow out. Many of the things I do here would not work in another area......that's something I found out many years ago.

I really like the statement "don't get wound up in the axle". Over thinking some of this and using genetic guidelines when most of us have no idea what genetics are birds are really carrying, is going to be a quick trip to burn out. Remember Bob's great advice..........keep it simple and go down the middle of the road.

Walt

 

[3riverschick]

No it is not and that is why many times I qualify my advice with "it works here for me the way I manage my flock". I live in a place that is ideal for raising poultry. I am 10 miles from the place that was once called "The egg capitol of the world" (Petaluma CA). Every area and every type of management changes how the birds grow out. Many of the things I do here would not work in another area......that's something I found out many years ago.

I really like the statement "don't get wound up in the axle". Over thinking some of this and using genetic guidelines when most of us have no idea what genetics are birds are really carrying, is going to be a quick trip to burn out. Remember Bob's great advice..........keep it simple and go down the middle of the road.

Walt

Petaluma,
Home of the USCG Chef's School. Ever think about selling them fresh farm eggs?
Best,
Karen

 

[3riverschick]

Boo-Yah!! Sussex Rule!!

General View of the Agriculture of the County of Sussex .
Drawn Up For The Board of Agriculture and Internal Improvement .
By the Rev. Arthur Young - 1808
Pages 391 and 392
http://tinyurl.com/m4xyede ( choose page 392 and scroll back to Page 391 ,
SECT. VI.-rPOULTRY.
"North Chappel, Kindford, &c. are famous for their fowls. They are fattened here to a
size and perfection unknown elsewhere. The food given them is ground oats made
into gruel, mixed with hogs'-grease, sugar, pot-liquor(1), and milk; or ground
oats, treacle (2), and suet; also sheep's plucks (3), &c.; and they are kept very warm:
they are always crammed in the morning and at night. They mix the pot-liquor with
a few handfuls of oatmeal; boil it: it is then taken off the fire, and the meal is
wetted, so as to be made to roll into pieces of a sufficient size for cramming:
the fowls are put into the coop two or three days before they begin to cram them,
which is done for a fortnight, and then sold to the higglers. They will weigh, when
full grown, 71b. each, and are sold at 4s. 6d. and 5*.; the average weight, 51b.;
but there are instances of these fowls weighing double this. Mr. Turner, of North
Chappel, a tenant of Lord Egrcmont's, crams 200 in a year. Many fat capons are
fed in this manner; good ones always look pale, and waste away: great art and
attention is requisite to cut them, and numbers are destroyed in the operation,
The Sussex breed are too long in their body, to cut them with much success,
which is done at three quarters old. The Darking fowls (4), as they are called, are
all raised in the Weald of Sussex; but the finest market for them is Horsham.
The five-clawed breed have been considered as the best sort: this however is
a great mistake, and it took its origin in some fowls with this peculiarity, that
happened to be very large and fine, which laid the foundation of what have been
since called the Darking, or Jive-clawed fowl, and considered in other parts of
England as the prime stock; but such a thing is hardly known in Sussex; it is a
b-a-s-t-a-r-d breed. The fowls at Lord Egremont's table, of the Sussex breed,
have very frequently astonished, the company by their size."

Definitions from around the Net:
(1) pot liquor : liquor in which meat, fish, or vegetables have been boiled; stock.
(2) treacle : a blend of molasses, invert sugar, and corn syrup used as
syrup —called also golden syrup
(3) Sheep Pluck is a collection of Sheep organs, usually consisting of the heart,
liver and kidney, but may also include other internal organs.
(4) Dorking fowls . Note the reference above predates Brown by 98 yrs. and
Moubray by 7 yrs..
Races of domestic poultry (1906)
Author: Brown, Edward, 1851-1939
https://archive.org/details/racesofdomesticp00brow
Page 25:
History. — The first definite description of the
Dorking, or Darking, as it was then called, with
details enabling us to recognise it, is found in Mou-
bray's ' Practical Treatise,' which was first published
in 1815.*
' The Darking Fowl, so called from a town in Surrey,
where probably the variety was first bred, and where,
and in its vicinity, they are to be found in great plenty
and perfection, is, in the third degree, the largest of our
fowls, well shaped, having a long, capacious body and
short legs, and is a plentiful layer.

 

[thedragonlady]

I'm not sure this would work in the North. I've never raised strong birds in the winter. Then again I've never thrown them whole corn, either. But, raising birds through the winter in NH stinks.

Herb Holtz, in Iowa, used to hatch all his LF in the winter.He had enclosed houses though. He fed lots of whole grains, including wheat, oats, and corn to his birds, after he saw how small some birds' internal organs were on ground feeds at cull slaughtering time. Herb was a farmer, who bred a lot of really good LF, especially Silver Laced Wyandottes. His advice helped me to be able raise competitive LF in the South.

 

[Ripster]

Herb Holtz, in Iowa, used to hatch all his LF in the winter.He had enclosed houses though. He fed lots of whole grains, including wheat, oats, and corn to his birds, after he saw how small some birds' internal organs were on ground feeds at cull slaughtering time. Herb was a farmer, who bred a lot of really good LF, especially Silver Laced Wyandottes. His advice helped me to be able raise competitive LF in the South.

Herb had some amazing Silver Laced Wyandottes and they were BIG.

 

[Pozees]

Boo-Yah!! Sussex Rule!!

General View of the Agriculture of the County of Sussex .
Drawn Up For The Board of Agriculture and Internal Improvement .
By the Rev. Arthur Young - 1808
Pages 391 and 392
http://tinyurl.com/m4xyede ( choose page 392 and scroll back to Page 391 ,
SECT. VI.-rPOULTRY.
"North Chappel, Kindford, &c. are famous for their fowls. They are fattened here to a
size and perfection unknown elsewhere. The food given them is ground oats made
into gruel, mixed with hogs'-grease, sugar, pot-liquor(1), and milk; or ground
oats, treacle (2), and suet; also sheep's plucks (3), &c.; and they are kept very warm:
they are always crammed in the morning and at night. They mix the pot-liquor with
a few handfuls of oatmeal; boil it: it is then taken off the fire, and the meal is
wetted, so as to be made to roll into pieces of a sufficient size for cramming:
the fowls are put into the coop two or three days before they begin to cram them,
which is done for a fortnight, and then sold to the higglers. They will weigh, when
full grown, 71b. each, and are sold at 4s. 6d. and 5*.; the average weight, 51b.;
but there are instances of these fowls weighing double this. Mr. Turner, of North
Chappel, a tenant of Lord Egrcmont's, crams 200 in a year. Many fat capons are
fed in this manner; good ones always look pale, and waste away: great art and
attention is requisite to cut them, and numbers are destroyed in the operation,
The Sussex breed are too long in their body, to cut them with much success,
which is done at three quarters old. The Darking fowls (4), as they are called, are
all raised in the Weald of Sussex; but the finest market for them is Horsham.
The five-clawed breed have been considered as the best sort: this however is
a great mistake, and it took its origin in some fowls with this peculiarity, that
happened to be very large and fine, which laid the foundation of what have been
since called the Darking, or Jive-clawed fowl, and considered in other parts of
England as the prime stock; but such a thing is hardly known in Sussex; it is a
b-a-s-t-a-r-d breed. The fowls at Lord Egremont's table, of the Sussex breed,
have very frequently astonished, the company by their size."

Definitions from around the Net:
(1) pot liquor : liquor in which meat, fish, or vegetables have been boiled; stock.
(2) treacle : a blend of molasses, invert sugar, and corn syrup used as
syrup —called also golden syrup
(3) Sheep Pluck is a collection of Sheep organs, usually consisting of the heart,
liver and kidney, but may also include other internal organs.
(4) Dorking fowls . Note the reference above predates Brown by 98 yrs. and
Moubray by 7 yrs..
Races of domestic poultry (1906)
Author: Brown, Edward, 1851-1939
https://archive.org/details/racesofdomesticp00brow
Page 25:
History. — The first definite description of the
Dorking, or Darking, as it was then called, with
details enabling us to recognise it, is found in Mou-
bray's ' Practical Treatise,' which was first published
in 1815.*
' The Darking Fowl, so called from a town in SuiTey,
where probably the variety was first bred, and where,
and in its vicinity, they are to be found in great plenty
and perfection, is, in the third degree, the largest of our
fowls, well shaped, having a long, capacious body and
short legs, and is a plentiful layer.

Boo-yah, indeed! LOL What a great morning read!

 

[armorfirelady]

. I used a fowler's hook, grab them up, take them to the block, lay his neck and head out and chop.
Still learning. Still listening. Still growing, I hope.

This has nothing to do with everyone's conversation on here but I wanted to say I bought one of those fowler hooks at a yard sale this summer. I had to ask what it was and when they told me I bought it. I doubt I will ever have need to use it but I couldn't pass it up.

It was an old farm that the parents were selling but they had kept everything. I wish I could have bought all the old stuff. I bought a rug beater also. That works so much better than a broom.

 

[fowlman01]

Boo-Yah!! Sussex Rule!!

General View of the Agriculture of the County of Sussex .
Drawn Up For The Board of Agriculture and Internal Improvement .
By the Rev. Arthur Young - 1808
Pages 391 and 392
http://tinyurl.com/m4xyede ( choose page 392 and scroll back to Page 391 ,
SECT. VI.-rPOULTRY.
"North Chappel, Kindford, &c. are famous for their fowls. They are fattened here to a
size and perfection unknown elsewhere. The food given them is ground oats made
into gruel, mixed with hogs'-grease, sugar, pot-liquor(1), and milk; or ground
oats, treacle (2), and suet; also sheep's plucks (3), &c.; and they are kept very warm:
they are always crammed in the morning and at night. They mix the pot-liquor with
a few handfuls of oatmeal; boil it: it is then taken off the fire, and the meal is
wetted, so as to be made to roll into pieces of a sufficient size for cramming:
the fowls are put into the coop two or three days before they begin to cram them,
which is done for a fortnight, and then sold to the higglers. They will weigh, when
full grown, 71b. each, and are sold at 4s. 6d. and 5*.; the average weight, 51b.;
but there are instances of these fowls weighing double this. Mr. Turner, of North
Chappel, a tenant of Lord Egrcmont's, crams 200 in a year. Many fat capons are
fed in this manner; good ones always look pale, and waste away: great art and
attention is requisite to cut them, and numbers are destroyed in the operation,
The Sussex breed are too long in their body, to cut them with much success,
which is done at three quarters old. The Darking fowls (4), as they are called, are
all raised in the Weald of Sussex; but the finest market for them is Horsham.
The five-clawed breed have been considered as the best sort: this however is
a great mistake, and it took its origin in some fowls with this peculiarity, that
happened to be very large and fine, which laid the foundation of what have been
since called the Darking, or Jive-clawed fowl, and considered in other parts of
England as the prime stock; but such a thing is hardly known in Sussex; it is a
b-a-s-t-a-r-d breed. The fowls at Lord Egremont's table, of the Sussex breed,
have very frequently astonished, the company by their size."

Definitions from around the Net:
(1) pot liquor : liquor in which meat, fish, or vegetables have been boiled; stock.
(2) treacle : a blend of molasses, invert sugar, and corn syrup used as
syrup —called also golden syrup
(3) Sheep Pluck is a collection of Sheep organs, usually consisting of the heart,
liver and kidney, but may also include other internal organs.
(4) Dorking fowls . Note the reference above predates Brown by 98 yrs. and
Moubray by 7 yrs..
Races of domestic poultry (1906)
Author: Brown, Edward, 1851-1939
https://archive.org/details/racesofdomesticp00brow
Page 25:
History. — The first definite description of the
Dorking, or Darking, as it was then called, with
details enabling us to recognise it, is found in Mou-
bray's ' Practical Treatise,' which was first published
in 1815.*
' The Darking Fowl, so called from a town in SuiTey,
where probably the variety was first bred, and where,
and in its vicinity, they are to be found in great plenty
and perfection, is, in the third degree, the largest of our
fowls, well shaped, having a long, capacious body and
short legs, and is a plentiful layer.

I guess he didn't like Dorkings.........

w.