My Dark Cornish project

[Kulafarmer]

Hi there,,,,
I am also doing a dark cornish experiment,
Well more of a madman chicken farm!
Hatched out 3 batches of dark cornish chicks with my incubator, so now i have 21 mixed at 14 weeks about 29 at 9 weeksish, and 20 at 4 weeks about,
How many weeks are you thinking they need to be before harvest?
Am replacing my original flock so will keep a dozen hens and a couple roos to make two small flocks but everybody else is going to get turned into chicken dinner! Including the older birds, i think theres 18 hens and a big bloody roo.
Just curious on how many weeks, not really wanting to weigh them as thats a bit challenging to say the least,,,, so close counts!

 

[Parront]

Hi there,,,,
I am also doing a dark cornish experiment,
Well more of a madman chicken farm!
Hatched out 3 batches of dark cornish chicks with my incubator, so now i have 21 mixed at 14 weeks about 29 at 9 weeksish, and 20 at 4 weeks about,
How many weeks are you thinking they need to be before harvest?
Am replacing my original flock so will keep a dozen hens and a couple roos to make two small flocks but everybody else is going to get turned into chicken dinner! Including the older birds, i think theres 18 hens and a big bloody roo.
Just curious on how many weeks, not really wanting to weigh them as thats a bit challenging to say the least,,,, so close counts!

14 week old males that are annoying the hens and crowing, are old enough already! A "big bloody roo" is also old enough, if you are not keeping him. Hens that are still laying well but are getting old are old enough when they stop laying and start to molt, no use feeding them all winter!

 

[archeryrob]

I was thinking 16 to 20 weeks, but that is the purpose of this entire project was to weigh them every week and see their weights. I am keeping the two largest roo's and largest hens to keep the genetic big. I am guessing I should have got a few more hens, but I can always keep a few from the resulting meat flock later.

 

[Kulafarmer]

Archeryrob,,
Perfect, was looking for confirmation, was exactly what we were thinking on the timing, i like having an egg flock, was what i started with, had chosen dark cornish because they were good foragers and were bigger birds, original flock isnt laying as much now so incubated the new birds from my flocks eggs, roo/hens are running about 50% on viable eggs, anywho,,, we will be in the chicken for a while,

 

[archeryrob]

So you're ahead of me on this. Your first birds are going slow on laying? ? I realize they aren't the best layers, maybe every other day. But post some of your observations.

 

[Kulafarmer]

So you're ahead of me on this. Your first birds are going slow on laying? ? I realize they aren't the best layers, maybe every other day. But post some of your observations.

The mature birds lay pretty good actually, in their first and second year i got at least one a day from most of them, a lot of eggs,,,,
The first batch is only 14 weeksish, so dont think quite to laying stage, will see though because im going to clear the original flock out in a week or so, original flock is about 3 or 4 years.

 

[archeryrob]

Week 12 - The weigh in for 8/21 is complete and it left me wishing I might have bought a few more hens 54 and 59 are very light. They might stay for now, but they are looking like the first hens to be culled. I am very impressed with the Roo 56 as he is almost 3.5# and 62 is calm, close in weight and crowing. Color coding added to show the roosters and Sonya’s three from the Cornish hen’s easily.

 

[Mosey2003]

Is 56 close behind 62 as far as sexual maturity, do you think? Are you factoring that in when you choose?

 

[archeryrob]

Yes, those two are probably my keepers. The first round of meat chick could get a few elevated to replace 54 and 59.

With the time I could see the Roo 56 alone with 50, 51, 52 and 61 and upgrade a lot of them. I guess I'll see how well they grow and lay and determine how many get culled and how few stay in the breeders coop.

 

[archeryrob]

Week 13 and I ordered new bands from Cutler Supply and changed them out. They are numbered newNuber_oldNumber