Meat Bird crossing?

[EOD Daddy]

I have read people keeping meat birds back and trying to raise them. Some with better success than others. Everything I have read is breeding like Freedom Ranger Rooster to Freedom Ranger hens. I have been wondering is anyone has every tried to cross like a Kosher King Rooster over a Freedom Ranger Hen or one of the meat roosters over say Freedom Rangers special New Hampshire Hen or the enhanced Delaware chickens that are now available? or even the NH and Del cross?
Just wondering if you did this what quality of meat bird you would get? Or if anyone has every tried crossing them. Sorry to ask so many questions but Just had a heart transplant and my mind is the only place I can do anything right now. So I am planning out all kinds of things for when I am back to 100%!

 

[FunClucks]

Most of those crosses, you may have to just try it and see. The NH and Delawares breed uniformly, but the rest of them can have variable traits in their offspring. You would breed them, see how they turn out, and then cross the birds that have the traits you desire for the next breeding.

I'm doing a ginger broiler x ginger broiler cross right now, we'll see if they are large or not. I'll eat the small ones and hold back / breed the largest ones a few times until I'm happy with them.

 

[imacowgirl2]

I have read people keeping meat birds back and trying to raise them. Some with better success than others. Everything I have read is breeding like Freedom Ranger Rooster to Freedom Ranger hens. I have been wondering is anyone has every tried to cross like a Kosher King Rooster over a Freedom Ranger Hen or one of the meat roosters over say Freedom Rangers special New Hampshire Hen or the enhanced Delaware chickens that are now available? or even the NH and Del cross?
Just wondering if you did this what quality of meat bird you would get? Or if anyone has every tried crossing them. Sorry to ask so many questions but Just had a heart transplant and my mind is the only place I can do anything right now. So I am planning out all kinds of things for when I am back to 100%!

There is another poster around here who had Freedom Ranger NH crossed with Freedom Ranger Delaware (no longer available when I checked) because it produced a sex link chick. He seemed to be very happy with them. I have the Freedom Ranger New Hampshires and I’m quite pleased with them.

 

[HenriettaPizzaNolan]

I can't offer up any advice here but I just wanna say get well soon! A heart transplant can't be an easy recovery, but planning and dreaming like this is a great way to stay motivated and excited for the future while you heal. Keep dreaming and keep your spirits up, and soon enough you can make them a reality. Best of luck

 

[Cubaniton]

Most of those crosses, you may have to just try it and see. The NH and Delawares breed uniformly, but the rest of them can have variable traits in their offspring. You would breed them, see how they turn out, and then cross the birds that have the traits you desire for the next breeding.

I'm doing a ginger broiler x ginger broiler cross right now, we'll see if they are large or not. I'll eat the small ones and hold back / breed the largest ones a few times until I'm happy with them.

I had a few of those gingers, and they were very aggressive towards other chickens, at least that was my experience, maybe I just happened to get a batch of aggressive ones. However, they were not aggressive towards me.

 

[Cubaniton]

I have read people keeping meat birds back and trying to raise them. Some with better success than others. Everything I have read is breeding like Freedom Ranger Rooster to Freedom Ranger hens. I have been wondering is anyone has every tried to cross like a Kosher King Rooster over a Freedom Ranger Hen or one of the meat roosters over say Freedom Rangers special New Hampshire Hen or the enhanced Delaware chickens that are now available? or even the NH and Del cross?
Just wondering if you did this what quality of meat bird you would get? Or if anyone has every tried crossing them. Sorry to ask so many questions but Just had a heart transplant and my mind is the only place I can do anything right now. So I am planning out all kinds of things for when I am back to 100%!

If you want easier to raise meat birds, then stick to Red Rangers AKA Freedom Rangers.

If you are a daredevil and want to raise the Cornish X meat birds, then read this and pick out of it what will be useful to you:

Get yourself some chicks from a hatchery:

https://www.mcmurrayhatchery.com/jumbo_cornish_x_rocks.html

https://www.mcmurrayhatchery.com/big_red_broiler.html

Raise them and cross them. To raise the Jumbo Cornish X Rocks to reproduction age, you must restrict their feed intake, for example, feed them all they can eat for the first 3 weeks, then starting on the 4th week, cut back to only feeding twice a day until they step aside, then on the 5th week, only once a day, until they step aside, and on the six week, calculate how much they were eating per bird on the 5th week, and reduce that amount somewhat and give them that once a day, and if you see that they are gaining weight and they look too fat, or their legs are spreading apart, then reduce the feed more and more, and keep track of how healthy they physically look, feel their breast, if it feels like the breast is starting to split, you are feeding them too much, hold back on the feed more until their breast feels flush or the breast bone is barely noticeable.

Important fact: In order to restrict the feed of the Jumbo Cornish X Rocks, you must keep them away from all sources of food, that means you have to keep them caged, or in some sort of enclosure, so they will only have access to the food that you provide.

The Big Red Broilers you can raise like any other chicken, just make sure they don't eat too much so that they can be healthy enough for reproduction and egg laying.

Once you have adult Jumbo Cornish X Rock roosters, cross them with the Big Red Broiler hens, and the main reason for doing this is because the Jumbo Cornish X Rock hens are not very good layers, you will be lucky to get a good amount of eggs form them, specially if they are on the heavy side (due to lack of feed restriction), so by crossing the Cornish X rooster to the Big Red hens, you will get chicks that will be better at laying than the Cornish X, and they will grow faster or should at least, than the Big Reds, then it will be up to you to select the largest of the chicks and keep them for reproduction, and through selective breeding (using only the biggest birds) you will be able to produce large fast growers which will also provide you with a usable amount of eggs per week. This project will take you around 8 months or so before you will have your first eggs of the crosses in an incubator, good luck.

 

[EOD Daddy]

Ok what I was asking and must not have made it very clear was has anyone ever crossed to different breeds of the slower growing meat birds. Such as a Kosher King rooster over a Freedom Ranger Hen? If you did this do you think you would get more off spring that were meaty and grew well. I have read where a lot of people who tried to raise say Freedom Ranger x Freedom Ranger get slower growing and smaller chicks. I noticed that the freedom ranger color yield is a cross of two different slower growing meat birds.
So has anyone tried this?

 

[LTAY1946]

Ok what I was asking and must not have made it very clear was has anyone ever crossed to different breeds of the slower growing meat birds. Such as a Kosher King rooster over a Freedom Ranger Hen? If you did this do you think you would get more off spring that were meaty and grew well. I have read where a lot of people who tried to raise say Freedom Ranger x Freedom Ranger get slower growing and smaller chicks. I noticed that the freedom ranger color yield is a cross of two different slower growing meat birds.
So has anyone tried this?

Watch what this guy is doing. This is what you asked about. This is week 7 of fast growing meat bird x American Bresse. This is one of several youtube videos on this cross. Get well soon and dream on. This is not really 2 slower growers. It is one fast and one slow. I have crossed a Black Sex link Rooster onto a Rhode Island Red Hen and love that cross. The roosters are fast growing. I'm about to process some tomorrow I hope if all goes well. I think this is what I will hatch out some of soon for our use for grilling and frying.

 

[Cubaniton]

Ok what I was asking and must not have made it very clear was has anyone ever crossed to different breeds of the slower growing meat birds. Such as a Kosher King rooster over a Freedom Ranger Hen? If you did this do you think you would get more off spring that were meaty and grew well. I have read where a lot of people who tried to raise say Freedom Ranger x Freedom Ranger get slower growing and smaller chicks. I noticed that the freedom ranger color yield is a cross of two different slower growing meat birds.
So has anyone tried this?

You can actually cross any big birds you like, and you will always get good results, but the results will always vary. Those who have crossed heavy breeds and got small chicks, need to select ONLY the largest of those chicks, and if none meet their goal, then reject all the chicks and try a new hatch, until they are happy with some or all of the chicks, then select only the best of the best for breeding purpose and some of those chicks could benefit from breeding back to the parents only if they were inferior to the parents, but if the chicks were of better quality than the parent stock, then breed only those chicks with similar chicks, always breeding improvement on top of improvement. Improvement don't always happen overnight, it takes time, and a lot or record keeping, or else how will you know what was good and what was bad? Breeders practice a lot of culling, because it is what's needed in order to reach what they are looking for, if they breed mediocre results, they will never reach their objective.

 

[LTAY1946]

My black Sexlink Roo x RIR hens gave me very uniform rooster chicks. All looked like their dad. Not sure of the pullets as we only had about 10 to hatch and most were roos. The cross is actually 3/4 RIR and 1/4 Barred Rock. That may account for the peas in a pod look. They all grew faster than straight RIR Roos and maybe somewhat faster than the Black Sexlink roo which is a heavy x heavy cross.