Rainbow Ranger Project

[Mwhit]

Here’s a week 6 update. Birds are doing well outside despite the freezing temps overnight. No weights on them but hopefully when I get time this weekend. Next time I’ll keep better track of weights and how much feed they’ve gone through.

Overall very pleased. I have them in a 20x20 pen and they have been moved outside overnight to sleep in the 4x8 chicken tractor since week 4. Gonna rotate the pen to a new spot this weekend. The poop buildup hasn’t been bad so far. I have two picked out that I’m hoping are my keeper hens. I might do more but we’ll see. The checkered one is the smallest and is definitely a keeper.

 

[Mwhit]

Update:

Had to cull one of the birds right at the 7 week mark. It had issues walking and standing upright looked painful. When it dressed out I didn’t see any damage or issues with its organs.

I’ve also decided to switch from their 20x20 pen to just letting them out with the layers in the main chicken yard. They don’t move around much, just from waterer to feeder to their tractor.

I’ve switched the food to all flock as well 17%. If it takes longer to grow them, I’m fine with it.

2.6 lbs dressed at 7 weeks.

 

[chanceosunshine]

I loved letting mine free range. I wonder if your's will start moving around more. Mine were everywhere and the really enjoyed the garden, which was awesome since the season was over and they fertilized it for me.
I used Kalmbach Non-Gmo meat bird, I think it's 22%. My birds dressed out an average 8lbs for roosters (biggest was 9) and 6lbs for hens (biggest 7, smallest 5), but they were at 15 weeks, which is three weeks over what they should have been. My son wanted to come and help and that's when he was available.
My husband and I think they still would have been big birds at 12 weeks. They had a ton of visceral fat, which I removed before I weighed them. I'm thinking that past the 12 week mark they were just getting fat, not necessarily making meat.

We spared two hens. They were the smallest ones and most "layer type" in the group.

 

[Mwhit]

I loved letting mine free range. I wonder if your's will start moving around more. Mine were everywhere and the really enjoyed the garden, which was awesome since the season was over and they fertilized it for me.
I used Kalmbach Non-Gmo meat bird, I think it's 22%. My birds dressed out an average 8lbs for roosters (biggest was 9) and 6lbs for hens (biggest 7, smallest 5), but they were at 15 weeks, which is three weeks over what they should have been. My son wanted to come and help and that's when he was available.
My husband and I think they still would have been big birds at 12 weeks. They had a ton of visceral fat, which I removed before I weighed them. I'm thinking that past the 12 week mark they were just getting fat, not necessarily making meat.

We spared two hens. They were the smallest ones and most "layer type" in the group. View attachment 3310703

Dang that sounds like they were huge. Is that your full grown ranger hen in the back?

 

[chanceosunshine]

Dang that sounds like they were huge. Is that your full grown ranger hen in the back?

They're Kosher Kings, she and the black one were the smallest of the group. Most of them look like the barred one, but there were 4 that were mainly white and 3 that were barred and red.
I was concerned letting them go to that age, but they did fine. We did have two big boys that "pulled a hammy" and were limping by then, but no one killed over of a heart attack, which is what I worried about. With our Freedom Rangers we had one that just expired a couple of weeks before his harvest date, I assume from a heart attack?

 

[Mwhit]

Week 9:

One of the birds didn’t make it in the tractor at night and was picked off by a predator. I found my layer hens pecking at it after most of it had been eaten by something. Good news is that nothing has tried to get in to the tractors.

Noticeable size difference between rooster and hens. Most rooster seem to be heavy enough to process, but I’m giving them one more week. I’ve moved the 9 largest roosters in to a separate tractor out in the grass to put on their final weight.

I’ll be butchering in stages. First group will be the 9 roosters, I’ll move a second group in to the grass tractor and butcher when they get to size, then repeat with the rest.

Here’s what one day of poop in the grass tractor looks like.

 

[Mwhit]

Week 10 and 11 update

Butchered the majority of the roosters at 10wks. Largest dressed out at 5.6lbs. Most of the big guys seemed close to having leg problems if I kept them alive. They just barely waddled around and were easy to catch.

Kept the hens till the end of week 11. Smallest was 3.6 dressed and largest was 4.2.

My checkered keeper hen is a rooster, but I plan on keeping it + two of the smaller hens over the winter until it becomes a problem.

 

[gooseapplefarms]

How do the roosters compare to the chickens as far as breast size? I know cornish cross hens have huge breasts, how about these chickens?

 

[Mwhit]

The ten week rooster breasts were very large, almost close to what you would get at the store. Hens, not so much but still worthwhile.

I was worried the hens wouldn’t have much meat because they looked tiny, but they are much denser than my layers.

 

[gooseapplefarms]

Sounds like these birds did pretty well. How was the flavor? Something you would raise again?