Meattie order from Central Hatchery ... great price

[Swampfarmer]

I use these...

www.PoultryShrinkBags.com

They cost a bit more but they do an excellent job.

Ralph

 

[jaj121159]

Put in my order for 100 meat chickens from Central, only $80 plus shiping for them. Hatch date will be 21 March ... Got to say that both times I have called them (once for Q&A and once to order) I have been very impressed with what I have heard. In my opinion they are a no frills hatchery, seems that the same guy answers the phone and I think he might be the owner.

Did mail order DP last year so decided to try straight meats this year for comparison. The kids got too attached to the DP and made slaughter day hard for the roos they got attached to. Going to keep the brooder outside so I think that will help with the attachement as well.

The owner does answer the phone. It is basically a family operation. The owner's name is Phil and is quite a guy. As far as a no frills operation, it is. The hatchery is housed is a 40x80 building with a large area to prepare shipments. The north and west walls are nothing but incubators. These are Cornish X's for sure. He gets his eggs from a place in Iowa. The other breeds he sells are bred locally in Nebraska. I buy several 150 bird batches from Central every year. How do I know all this? He is literally seven miles down the road from me and I pick my broiler chicks up in person.

 

[Buster52]

That was the weight of my last batch at 8 weeks. This batch seems to be putting on weight faster. We'll see if that continues. Maybe I will process them earlier or maybe they will weigh more at 8 weeks. I'll let you know.

I've seen charts that plot weight gain vs. feed intake. Apparently, the efficiency decreases after 6 weeks. This is why most commercial growers process them at 6 weeks. The broilers I see in the grocery store are typically smaller than my birds.

Ralph

So can you and others give us an update on your Central hatchery meaties? Curious if I should give them a shot.

 

[Swampfarmer]

So can you and others give us an update on your Central hatchery meaties? Curious if I should give them a shot.

I am very happy with them. I plan to order another 100 from Central tomorrow. Here's the progress...

2 days old



2 weeks old


3 weeks old


4 weeks old


Ralph

 

[Beekissed]

I am very pleased with the health and vigor of my chicks from Central also...mine just turned a week old today. Here's a pic of a few of them a couple of days ago, meeting their new guardian roo for the first time. They were mutually pleased to have met!



I'll post progressive pics but mine won't be the big meat balls that Swamp's are until the end...I'm on the slow growing plan here!

 

[Swampfarmer]

Is that a White Leghorn?

I am very pleased with the health and vigor of my chicks from Central also...mine just turned a week old today. Here's a pic of a few of them a couple of days ago, meeting their new guardian roo for the first time. They were mutually pleased to have met!



I'll post progressive pics but mine won't be the big meat balls that Swamp's are until the end...I'm on the slow growing plan here!

 

[Beekissed]

Nah...a young White Rock roo. Don't even have his spurs yet!

 

[Beekissed]

They are three weeks old now, but I haven't taken a picture this week. I'll get one tomorrow. They are much bigger, only a week later. 104 birds have eaten about 450 pounds of feed in three weeks. Only Cornish Cross can do that. At three weeks, the legs on these birds are almost as big as my 5 month old Leghorns. They are now moving with the Cornish waddle.

Ralph

I was doing the math on what mine have eaten in 2wks and they(52 CX chicks, 2 mutt roo chicks and 1 White Rock roo(approx. 4-5 mo.)) have consumed 50 lbs. of chick starter in these 2 wks. They have consumed approx. 1.1 lb of feed per bird in the past 2 wks.

Ralph, yours have consumed 4.32 lbs. of feed per bird in the past 3 wks. Now, I'm assuming my feed consumption will increase weekly as they get bigger, so I'll be trying to keep track of total feed bought and fed by the end of the grow out.

You have fed continuous feed or 12/12? I have fed pretty much continuous until the second week and then started feeding twice a day. I'm also fermenting feeds. Your birds are larger and will definitely be larger a lot faster than mine...particularly since mine are going out on free range next week.

I'm trying to wrap my mind around if I am saving feed/costs by fermenting it, as the studies claim, but I think it will be very hard to calculate the total savings until I am completely done with this batch and can add up the feed, costs, time of grow out and the total lbs of meat harvested.

Sure hope it's been worth it to do the fermenting prior to feeding....

 

[Swampfarmer]

I was doing the math on what mine have eaten in 2wks and they(52 CX chicks, 2 mutt roo chicks and 1 White Rock roo(approx. 4-5 mo.)) have consumed 50 lbs. of chick starter in these 2 wks. They have consumed approx. 1.1 lb of feed per bird in the past 2 wks.

Ralph, yours have consumed 4.32 lbs. of feed per bird in the past 3 wks. Now, I'm assuming my feed consumption will increase weekly as they get bigger, so I'll be trying to keep track of total feed bought and fed by the end of the grow out.

You have fed continuous feed or 12/12? I have fed pretty much continuous until the second week and then started feeding twice a day. I'm also fermenting feeds. Your birds are larger and will definitely be larger a lot faster than mine...particularly since mine are going out on free range next week.

I'm trying to wrap my mind around if I am saving feed/costs by fermenting it, as the studies claim, but I think it will be very hard to calculate the total savings until I am completely done with this batch and can add up the feed, costs, time of grow out and the total lbs of meat harvested.

Sure hope it's been worth it to do the fermenting prior to feeding....

Well, it looks like I need to make a correction. Nutrena switched things up on me and I just figured it out yesterday. On my last batch of birds, I had 50 pound bags of feed. Nutrena has changed the line to 40 pound bags. As of tomorrow, I have been feeding this batch for 5 weeks. They have consumed 19 bags = 760 pounds. I started with 104 birds, that is 7.3 pounds consumed per bird. At a 2:1 conversion ratio, they should average about 3.65 pounds dressed weight. One of my share partners prefers her birds between 3.5 and 4 pounds, so I will process a few on Saturday, @ 5 1/2 weeks old. I haven't weighed any yet, but I'm thinking some will dress close to 5 pounds now.

Ralph

 

[Beekissed]

How much did that feed cost per bag? I'm sorry if you mentioned it before, but I didn't see it when I reviewed the post. I'm just trying to get a handle on the typical cost of CX done in a traditional manner. There's a member on another post who was asking and, since I've never done them like everyone else, I didn't have a good answer for them.