October-hatch-along 2019

[FortCluck]

If you want a chicken with a lot of meat, you are probably going to have to buy chicks that are Cornish cross or Red rangers. You cannot hatch these two breeds yourself.

Most of us who have dual purpose breeds have crossed them to get the most meat ratio out of all our breeds in our flock.

 

[Maiahr]

@FortCluck thank you. I will see if we have these breeds here at all.

 

[Maiahr]

I apologize, I don't remember whose chick was picking on the basket wire during hatch.. ? I use these plastic baskets in the hatcher to separate eggs. I bought them from a dollar shop.

 

[FortCluck]

I apologize, I don't remember whose chick was picking on the basket wire during hatch.. ? I use these plastic baskets in the hatcher to separate eggs. I bought them from a dollar shop.

That was @Compost King

 

[Maiahr]

Thank you

 

[FortCluck]

@FortCluck thank you. I will see if we have these breeds here at all.

I know dual purpose takes a little bit longer to have meat usually 20 weeks. If you do Cornish cross or red rangers it's a lot less time, but only down side is you can only get chicks.

I'm going to see how big my JG cross can get at 14 weeks if they're too small I'll wait the additional 6 weeks.

@igorsMistress crosses her turkens to make meat birds, I'm unsure when she processes them.

 

[Compost King]

Although I never bred Red Ranger x Red Ranger I believe it is possible. Not sure how much different the results would be. Red Rangers seem like a faster growing and larger version of New Hampshires. I kept my Red Ranger Females and crossed them to Heritage Roosters and love the results.
a Guy I sold chickens to cross a Jersey Giant to a Red Ranger and said it resulted in the largest chicken he has ever seen. He did not comment on how fast it grew but he said a predator got a large meal out of him.

 

[igorsMistress]

I've just begun my DP project. The first boys we processed were about 18 to 20 weeks. The last one was about 4 weeks later and was definitely a larger carcass. I don't know what the full background is for the those but JG was for sure in there along with Bresse and who knows what else.

@Compost King did most of the work mixing things up so I've got eggs from his Turken projects in my incubator. They're mixed with Dorking and Red Rangers for adding size for the table.

Old breeds like Dorking and JG were created as table birds before humans genetically engineered the Cornish. I prefer them over the Cornish for sustainability. Like @FortCluck said, you can't breed Cornish or Red Rangers true.

 

[FortCluck]

Twin #2 says hello. I found him this morning, he scared me yesterday because I couldn't find him.

 

[igorsMistress]

Twin #2 says hello. I found him this morning, he scared me yesterday because I couldn't find him.

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You are hopelessly addicted I bet you'll be joining the hatchers anonymous thread before too long