Meat amount from bird question

[bigredfeather]

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If fed correctly a CX won't have unbalanced growth like a DP breed does.

 

[johnsons-r-us]

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I was wondering the same thing....I don't think I've read about anyone here ending up with a 3lb bird using the cx.

 

[bigredfeather]

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I was wondering the same thing....I don't think I've read about anyone here ending up with a 3lb bird using the cx.

I sold a ton of them that size and even smaller this past Summer. People wanted them to cut in half and grill. I had to pull 5-6 week old birds to get this size.

 

[johnsons-r-us]

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I was wondering the same thing....I don't think I've read about anyone here ending up with a 3lb bird using the cx.

I sold a ton of them that size and even smaller this past Summer. People wanted them to cut in half and grill. I had to pull 5-6 week old birds to get this size.

Ok, I see. You chose to get them small. I didn't realize people did that. Yum, they sound good!

What did you mean by "unbalanced growth"?

 

[Beekissed]

The last time I roasted one of my CX I had grown, it fed 8 adult people....big eatin' people, trust me! I wouldn't sell a CX that only weighed 3 lbs nor did my efforts even produce one that small. Mine averaged 10 lb. live weight and 6 lbs. dressed.

It had nothing to do with it being raised organically, or all naturally, at all, as I raise mine all naturally, free ranged with my DP flock and they finished out at comparable weights achieved by those raising them with more commercial methods.

It all depends on how you raise them, how long you keep them, and if you do the processing yourself to determine if it is cost effective to raise your own. If I had raised mine like many do on this forum, I'd never feel like I'd gotten my money's worth.

 

[BoomChickaRocka]

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hamburger loses its weight base on the fat content.

 

[ScottyHOMEy]

I'll join in with wyoDreamer on this one. An eight-week CornishX will dress out about 5# or better. If it dresses out to 3# it was pulled and processed early. There are folks that prefer them that age and that's fine. But it's that last few weeks (beyond the age when yours would have been butchered) that they pile on the breast and thigh meat. In those same weeks, their frame and gut grow some but not at the same rate as the meat. It's that rapid-growth nature of the beast that leads to recommendations for restricted feeding to keep them from developing pulmonary and other problems as they near their 8-week prime feed conversion rate. (Lots of folks have been quite successful feeding them on range or in other ways, but the recommendation I tell of is out there and widely observed.)

What might be interesting for comparison is to buy two birds, one like you had at about 3# and another that dresses about 5. It won't be quite the same comparison to the way you weighed your bird because what I'm proposing will leave the bones in the legs and wings, but , after weighing each whole bird, cut them up into breasts, wings, legs and boneless thighs. Then weigh the remaining carcasses. I have an idea you'll find that the carcass weight is a greater percentage of the weight of the smaller whole bird than it is of the larger.

If meat-per-dollar is your aim, I expect the larger birds will be the more efficient. If your preference, for whatever reason, is for the smaller birds, that will be the price and yield.

 

[Oregon Blues]

By the way, forum members who keep track of what they are spending report that the Cornish Cross chickens come to the table at somewhere between $1.20 and $1.80 a pound. It's better meat than store bought, but you can compare prices both to supermarket and to specialty free range dressed birds. Then you can decide what works for you.

You can't raise them for cheaper than Safeway puts them on sale for. It's a quality issue to raise your own, not purely economic.

 

[Titus2Woman]

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I have seen these prices... but I am very ignorant... does this include the bone? I want the better quality and more humane living conditions for the birds but honestly we can only afford so much right now so I am trying to feel things out and see if it makes sense for our family. I plan to start with layers and go from there. I will have to "hide" a coop for the meat birds... in the burbs that might be frowned on...

 

[johnsons-r-us]

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I have seen these prices... but I am very ignorant... does this include the bone? I want the better quality and more humane living conditions for the birds but honestly we can only afford so much right now so I am trying to feel things out and see if it makes sense for our family. I plan to start with layers and go from there. I will have to "hide" a coop for the meat birds... in the burbs that might be frowned on...

Strickly prices.....you won't be able to raise them cheaper. We have not done meaties yet, and we wait for sales such as $.69/lb for whole chickens, then stock our freezer. We get that several times a year around here. We are able to free range our chickens so feed is not really a big cost for us. Eggs are nice and will offset the routine costs. I'm not sure you would ever be able to get nice big CX in your freezer for less than a good sale at the grocery store. People have different motivations for having chickens though.