keeping a meatie and free-access food.

[chickensducks&agoose]

Got a meatie, trying to keep her alive. also, with winter coming, want to give the other hens enough snacks and food that they stay warm and don't freeze into hensicles. any ideas? would corn make her fat/die? layer pellets? i'd like something that would be nutritious for the girls, but not contribute to her ridiculous obesity.

 

[Ibicella]

CX literally do not have the "stop" button within their brains to make them stop eating. So it's not possible to have free access to food if you plan to keep them within the flock. Everyone will have to be on the same feeding schedule. Also make sure the CX is able to exercise daily, and if she can work for her food scratching around and free ranging some of the time, that's great. They need a lot of exercise.

Others here will have a better idea of feeding and stuff, but that's the basics.

 

[terri9630]

chickensducks&agoose :

Got a meatie, trying to keep her alive. also, with winter coming, want to give the other hens enough snacks and food that they stay warm and don't freeze into hensicles. any ideas? would corn make her fat/die? layer pellets? i'd like something that would be nutritious for the girls, but not contribute to her ridiculous obesity.

Does she ever get up off the ground to roost or hop up on to stuff? If not put extra stuff out on a table the others can hop/fly on to.​

 

[chickensducks&agoose]

she's real active, roosts on a 3 1/2 foot roost at night, and has adopted my four 8 week old chicks.. she sleeps with one under each wing and one on her back. the Barred Rock has to sleep next to one of the wing ones. She is huge though, and I was thinking about building a feeding cage, with the door too small to accommodate her bulk... or hanging it really high with some sort of thin roost that she was too big for... she runs around and free ranges though, and I really, really like her.

 

[Dogfish]

How old?

I'd keep an eye on her ability to walk, etc. Be prepared to cull. Keeping the CX for longer periods is admirable, but you need to realize that as much as you try to baby them along, they will succomb to their genetics.

 

[chickensducks&agoose]

16 weeks i think. maybe 18.

 

[Dogfish]

We had one Rooster we kept for about 20 weeks. He started going lame and was not having a good time of it. Watch their comb. If it starts turning blue/purple, you have a problem developing. The rib meat in ours had turned green due to poor circulation. That was the only one we ever had that issue with. I hope your hen does well. Someone here had kept a few for a year or so, but again, genetics caught up with the bird.

 

[SteveH]

I allow mine to fill theirs crops once daily on commercial feed , a 16+% layer ration bumped up to around 21% with catfood kibble and fed wet with feeder space for all . Then they get all the grass or hay they want and a few table scraps if I have them . I also give them free choice crushed limestone mixed with crushed egg shell .The others in the pen get the same but also have a creep feeder for free choice feeding ; same feed mix but left dry .
The creep feeder , with some shattercane for that day's ' all-you-can-eat ' green stuff .

 

[Brown Farmer]

Your feeding regeme looks good to me. I had 2 CX wintered last winter. Incubated their crosses with Cochin. The heavier of the 2 died at about 11 months. The other stopped laying at 1 year and wound up in the freezer. Towards the end of lay the fertility was very low.