ording chicks and turkeys

[BirchHatchery]

i am planin on ordering 10 black sex link roos and 10 red sex links to raise up for roasters to see wich i like better but im thinkin of ordering around 5 turkeys can i order turkeys with the chicks? all the turkeys i seen are around 7-8 dollars a peice this seems high or is this a normal price and how long does it take a heritage breed turkey to get big for thanksgiving?

 

[SamG347]

7-8 dollars for poults isn't bad. Heritage breed is the way to go! I like the broad breasted turks but heritage are better looking and are said to have a better taste but I would have to say that is personal preferance. I would just go with Cornish or a Colored Ranger variety though if your going for meat. Might as well make it worth your while.

 

[BirchHatchery]

no thanks on the cornish i can raise leghorn roos chepier that cornish rocks and dual propuse chickens for the same price as cornish rocks. now how many weeks on a turkey?

 

[SamG347]

Birch you can raise a Leghorn roo cheaper than a cornish because the leghorn roo will probably top out at 2-3lb dressed bird. I mean I don't know what you are raising the birds for but if you are raising them for the table/freezer why not go with Colored Rangers then? And a turkey is anywhere from 24-28 weeks. You can just eyeball it really.

 

[pdpatch]

Our experience with red sex link roo's is that they are skinny and don't make good meat birds. They dressed out at around 1 to 2 pounds less then the other meat birds we got at the same time. It was two years ago we got about 8 or so as packing peanuts from McMurry's.

Turkey and chicks are not shipped at the same time from McMurry's there is any where from a few day to a week or more difference of when they are shipped because the use a different schedule to hatch Turkeys. But yes you can order them at the same time, but the minimums are separate.

For turkey's Great Whites and BB bronze usually go about 20 week for optimum Feed cost to weight ratio. 30 Weeks for Heritage types.
Great whites will be slightly larger the BB Bronze but the White meat is about the same.
But you can Butcher Early or later. We had one BB bronze female that was really mean and we did her at 12 weeks. Because turkey's are usually slow cooked you have much more range of when you can butcher.

The check to see if a turkey is ready to butcher you get behind the turkey and reach around it an feel the Keel bone, if it protrudes then it's not ready, it it is flush with the chest then it's ready.

Tom

 

[BirchHatchery]

wow all that for my simple answer. i like to stick with heritage breeds for my meat i dont agree with the cornish rock i live simplier than most i raise leghorns for friers dont put em down if u got a problem with what i raise for meat dont put a reply down

 

[Southerngirl]

I order turkeys and chicks from Cackle hatchery and they do ship both together; plus there is no minimum order on the turkeys.

 

[SamG347]

Not putting down what you raise trying to give you hints to bigger and better birds. If you dont like cornish try COLORED RANGERS like I stated before. Since you are more into "heritage" birds though I don't consider leghorns heritage try the colored rangers. The feed/time you put into raising a leghorn/sexlink rooster to a good size is a lot more than you would put into raising one of these birds up to that size..and a fraction of the time.

http://www.jmhatchery.com/free-range-broiler/freedom-ranger-chicks/prod_5.html

 

[BirchHatchery]

i do call leghorns heritage breed my grandfather raised roos for the soul purpose of fryers as do i it takes me 20 weeks to get a fryer and i love them for meat its been around far longer than any cornish rock or colord broiler has can and will produce on for years. i guess the thing that bothers me the most ia that when somone posts somthing about raising a true chicken for meator like the question i posted somone automactially implys cornish rock has to be the meat bird and heritage birds automatically get put down beacuse theirs not enuff meat on them or it takes to long to raise them for meat i have nothing againts cornish rocks if that wat u want to raise for meat go ahead but dont put down ppl when they ask if u can raise dual purpose breeds for meat hence the name dual purpose This CORNISH ROCK Area hasn;t been around for long if u look back to the 30s 40s chicken sold in stores were from leghorn cockerals any chicken can be used for meat size doesn't matter to everyone and nither does time i raise 100s of birds up at a time so i no what im doing when it comes to raising chickens not saying i no it all but i no what i can raise for the top price of meat and flavor. Also like to add most of the people that automatically say cornish rocks probly are in a urban settin and have never been raised up or has much true farming background. around here no one wants cornish rocks cuz thats not what grandma use to have in her coop

 

[SamG347]

Sorry you feel that way about the Cornish. But they became popular with more Urban and Rural settings because you can get a good sized bird in 7-10 weeks. I agree the flavor/old time aspect might not be in this bird but is has had a lot of work put in to developing it to be put down. Also I didn't know your expirence with meatbirds that is why I refered you to Colored Rangers and Cornish. And I and many of the people I know who live in Rural America don't seem to have any probs with Cornish over the classic. Dual-purpose birds are nice and can be nice table birds. But If I'm looking to raise a decent number of birds and have consistant results I would go with Colored rangers/cornish.

But back to your question yes you can order Turkeys with chicks.
Good Luck with whatever you choose.