Naked Neck/Turken Thread

[Kev]

I liked the skin on the NN much better as it crisped up beautifully, but I did like the flavoring of the Biel slightly more. It was pretty darn close though....so I'm thinking a cross of the two would be darn near perfect.

I also have to wonder if the timing of the culls had something to do with the difference in flavoring. I culled the NNs a couple months back when there wasn't much to forage here. (I live in the AZ desert. Not much green.) The Biels have had the advantage of all the nut grass that grows here during monsoon season along with a variety of wild flowers and lots of crickets and grasshoppers. No comparison on the skin, though. The NNs won that hands down.

I also keep looking at Bresse as a possible cross with NNs. I'm not sure if the white feathering in the Bresse is dominant, but if it were, some white feathered naked necked Bresse crosses could prove mighty tasty.

I think so- it is same here, very lush during few months(winter time here) then it's bare bones for most of the year. The flock used to be truly free range- sleeping in trees and everything and only penned up for breeding or setting on peafowl eggs.. during the winters the yolks are orange, with many showing variable red tinting(thought those were beautiful) but from spring-fall the yolks are just a plain yellow. It also seemed to me the winter birds had some more taste but it was not so easy to measure... so I just never tried to comment on this.

It gets fuzzy when claims are made about breed X being so tasty with the implication it's genetics/inherent to the breed itself... but then some of those breeds are also raised in a highly specialized way.. like bresse are. Free range then very confined with a very strict diet for a period of time before butchering. Which is it... genetics or diet? Combination of both??

White bresse are recessive white. if you want to create a line of whites, cross with black NN if possible. It's because the white tends to be crisper and cleaner on a genetically black chicken but ultimately it does not make too much difference if doing repeated crosses back to pure bresse.

 

[DesertChic]

I know I'm not your son (or husband) but you had better watch that math...

I do have the grandest idea....CAPONS!!!

No hurry to dispatch them and they can clean up on those desert goodies for all they're worth.....lololol

Yeah...the math is tricky. I love having these bird and who doesn't love hatching them? But it's too easy to suddenly have more chickens than space. I'm trying to make a habit of culling 1-2 birds each weekend, and luckily I'm becoming more efficient at it.

I actually have a caponizing kit and books...but haven't mustered up the courage yet to try. As you'd previously suggested, I want to practice on some of my culls (already dead) before trying it on a live chicken. It's just hard to find the time to do everything I need to do. I'm still building pens and runs for my chickens, along with a variety of other smaller construction projects, and have a business to help run. And now that my son will be heading back to school, that's at loss of at least another 2 hours per day commute time.

I don't get much sleep.

 

[DesertChic]

I think so- it is same here, very lush during few months(winter time here) then it's bare bones for most of the year. The flock used to be truly free range- sleeping in trees and everything and only penned up for breeding or setting on peafowl eggs.. during the winters the yolks are orange, with many showing variable red tinting(thought those were beautiful) but from spring-fall the yolks are just a plain yellow. It also seemed to me the winter birds had some more taste but it was not so easy to measure... so I just never tried to comment on this.

It gets fuzzy when claims are made about breed X being so tasty with the implication it's genetics/inherent to the breed itself... but then some of those breeds are also raised in a highly specialized way.. like bresse are. Free range then very confined with a very strict diet for a period of time before butchering. Which is it... genetics or diet? Combination of both??

White bresse are recessive white. if you want to create a line of whites, cross with black NN if possible. It's because the white tends to be crisper and cleaner on a genetically black chicken but ultimately it does not make too much difference if doing repeated crosses back to pure bresse.

Great points about the Bresse! Maybe I'll trying modifying their diets first and see if that impacts the flavor of the meat.

Cross black NN to get white? LOL! It's enough to make my head explode!

I keep having flashback to one of my favorite art instructors lecturing that "black is the absence of all color, and white is the existence of all color, but if you mix all your paint together you can get black. You can only get white straight out of the tube." I'm starting to think that genetics and art are one and the same.

 

[hellbender]

Yeah...the math is tricky. I love having these bird and who doesn't love hatching them? But it's too easy to suddenly have more chickens than space. I'm trying to make a habit of culling 1-2 birds each weekend, and luckily I'm becoming more efficient at it.

I actually have a caponizing kit and books...but haven't mustered up the courage yet to try. As you'd previously suggested, I want to practice on some of my culls (already dead) before trying it on a live chicken. It's just hard to find the time to do everything I need to do. I'm still building pens and runs for my chickens, along with a variety of other smaller construction projects, and have a business to help run. And now that my son will be heading back to school, that's at loss of at least another 2 hours per day commute time.

I don't get much sleep.

A woman's work is never done!

The next time you butcher a couple cockerels, you might take 5 minutes (before scalding and try on an older bird. It certainly won't move and the testicles are much larger than a 4 to 6 week old bird.

 

[collie1470]

Great points about the Bresse! Maybe I'll trying modifying their diets first and see if that impacts the flavor of the meat. 

Cross black NN to get white? LOL! It's enough to make my head explode!   I keep having flashback to one of my favorite art instructors lecturing that "black is the absence of all color, and white is the existence of all color, but if you mix all your paint together you can get black. You can only get white straight out of the tube." I'm starting to think that genetics and art are one and the same. 

ah, the difference between light and pigment. Always a fun dicussion XD

 

[Kev]

Great points about the Bresse! Maybe I'll trying modifying their diets first and see if that impacts the flavor of the meat.

Cross black NN to get white? LOL! It's enough to make my head explode!

I keep having flashback to one of my favorite art instructors lecturing that "black is the absence of all color, and white is the existence of all color, but if you mix all your paint together you can get black. You can only get white straight out of the tube." I'm starting to think that genetics and art are one and the same.

lol my art teacher was quite dramatic also...wonderful teacher, though!

white in chickens is absence of color.

Recessive white is a single gene that tries to stop ALL pigments from going into the feather.

Dominant white is also a single gene but it only has a strong effect on black pigments and weakly so on the red/gold pigments. Great examples of this are red sex links with red bodies, white tails and necks. They are RIR colored with the DW 'preventing' the black from going in the tails and necks. Other great examples are buff laced vs gold laced, red pyle vs red duckwing.

For this reason, it is REQUIRED to first have a solid black chicken for a solid white via dominant white. It is not a requirement with recessive white.. but it 'helps' a little bit for a shinier cleaner white less prone to brassiness(yellowing).

The white chickens are white because they cannot show any color... but your art teacher is also correct- white reflects the whole(visible) color spectrum so they appear as white to your eyes. Kinda ironic, eh?

White chickens have no color yet they are throwing the whole spectrum at yer eyes!
Maybe I should teach art classes....

 

[Sierra987]

Please keep updates on their egg sizes?

The freedom rangers laid so small eggs when they were pullets. As hens, their eggs are okay size- have not weighed them so I don't have numbers.... I like good egg sizes too.

I will. And just to be clear, when I say large to extra large I am referring to the USDA egg sizes. Typically I like 60 - 65gm eggs from my hens. One LR hen that I've specifically tracked the last 4 days because she escapes her pen and lays in the hay barn has laid 4 eggs in 4 days, 3 of which are in the 60gm+ range and one was about 40gm. Egg shell quality is improving in the LR eggs too. They started with a lot of thin shelled eggs which I don't like because it increases the risk of them breaking and the hens eating them. They have oyster shell but I went ahead and switched them to a layer feed with extra calcium despite the fact that it isn't good for the roosters.

 

[hellbender]

I know...wrong thread but....if I'm following, these Chanteclers are recessive white??????????????

 

[Kev]

I know...wrong thread but....if I'm following, these Chanteclers are recessive white??????????????

I don't know for sure but would guess recessive white.... if you happen to know whites can 'pop up' from the reds, that's recessive white.

Or if someone has crossed whites with reds and got all reds that is also recessive white.

 

[jwells84]

Gotta show off my new babies.. apparently I had an incubator problem. These are from my flock but hatched out by someone elses incubator