Red Laced Cornish X and project talk (pics p. 8)

[Totalcolour]

* Are you pulling my leg?


White Rocks are white Plymouth Rocks, but those sold by the hatcheries fall short of looking like true, pure bred, Plymouth Rocks. True Plymouth White Rocks are larger and more meaty than the hatchery version.

* Oh, I was under the impression that those Cornish X birds could not be grown to full size, so I thought you were talking about something else that I didn't know about. My confusion.

Must be hard to grow them though. The ones we had could barely walk by butcher day.

So, if you cross them with your other birds, are the offspring more hardy, less prone to heart and other problems? Do you use the pullets or use a cockerel? I would think a cockerel wouldn't be strong enough to cover many hens.

There is a hatchery that sells white birds. They only sell a few breeds. I was thinking of trying some for meat, but maybe keep one for breeding.


What do you think?

 

[Cedarknob]

* Oh, I was under the impression that those Cornish X birds could not be grown to full size, so I thought you were talking about something else that I didn't know about. My confusion.

Must be hard to grow them though. The ones we had could barely walk by butcher day.

So, if you cross them with your other birds, are the offspring more hardy, less prone to heart and other problems? Do you use the pullets or use a cockerel? I would think a cockerel wouldn't be strong enough to cover many hens.

There is a hatchery that sells white birds. They only sell a few breeds. I was thinking of trying some for meat, but maybe keep one for breeding.


What do you think?

I have never owned one of those being marketed as "Heritage Whites", so can't answer other than they look pretty meaty in the picture.

The CX have to be kept on severely rationed, lower protein, grain based feed [I use commercial crumbles] to get them to breeding age. They can have all of the grass or other browse to eat as they want. It remains to be seen how healthy the crosses to an Ameraucana will remain. I'm hoping the slender Ameraucanas, a lean breed, will reduce the amount of fat I've always found in the mature CX's body cavity when I've butchered them. The fat makes them a great tasting stew hen, but not so great for their own health. The major health problem with CX, in my opinion, is their bred-in tendency for putting on fat. Cockerels could be used to cross breed, if kept small enough. In the commercial breeding programs, they live breed the parent lines by using restricted diets, and the cockerels often have to be replaced by younger ones. The females are spent and culled after their first year. These parent lines, not available to us, still have a short life before their lowered productivity and livability make them too expensive to keep. The chicks we buy are the terminal generation from crosses of 4 parent lines, and were never intended for anything other than slaughter at 7 weeks of age. Many individuals here are holding them to 8 weeks or longer to get larger broilers, but that is when the health problems start to surface.

My Ameraucana X CX crosses are being raised on free choice, 22% crumbles for maximum growth rate. So far they are healthy, though they can not handle heat as well as my other birds. The full feed diet is to test both their growth rate and livability. I have not kept tract of their weights, but know they are much bigger, faster growing, and carry far heavier meat than anything fed with them. They could be processed at 2 months of age if I wanted a small but fairly meaty carcass.

To breed the CX pullets, I have to feed them separately from the others, otherwise the CX eat too much and die. Cockerels or cocks from other breeds must be removed from a breeding pen of CX pullets and fed back up to keep them healthy. Since a chicken stays fertile from a single breeding for several days, this is really not a problem, other than the extra effort and pen space needed. While I can't pen a bunch of males together, due to serious fights when one is put back after being used to breed, and I don't want to have to keep separate pens for each male, I can just pull a male from his regular breeding pen and put him over the CX for a couple of days; for maximum fertility I can use a few different males in rotation, and return them to their regular harem with heavier, higher protein feed. This can keep the CX under a male at all times.

 

[kfacres]

I have never owned one of those being marketed as "Heritage Whites", so can't answer other than they look pretty meaty in the picture.

The CX have to be kept on severely rationed, lower protein, grain based feed [I use commercial crumbles] to get them to breeding age. They can have all of the grass or other browse to eat as they want. It remains to be seen how healthy the crosses to an Ameraucana will remain. I'm hoping the slender Ameraucanas, a lean breed, will reduce the amount of fat I've always found in the mature CX's body cavity when I've butchered them. The fat makes them a great tasting stew hen, but not so great for their own health. The major health problem with CX, in my opinion, is their bred-in tendency for putting on fat. Cockerels could be used to cross breed, if kept small enough. In the commercial breeding programs, they live breed the parent lines by using restricted diets, and the cockerels often have to be replaced by younger ones. The females are spent and culled after their first year. These parent lines, not available to us, still have a short life before their lowered productivity and livability make them too expensive to keep. The chicks we buy are the terminal generation from crosses of 4 parent lines, and were never intended for anything other than slaughter at 7 weeks of age. Many individuals here are holding them to 8 weeks or longer to get larger broilers, but that is when the health problems start to surface.

My Ameraucana X CX crosses are being raised on free choice, 22% crumbles for maximum growth rate. So far they are healthy, though they can not handle heat as well as my other birds. The full feed diet is to test both their growth rate and livability. I have not kept tract of their weights, but know they are much bigger, faster growing, and carry far heavier meat than anything fed with them. They could be processed at 2 months of age if I wanted a small but fairly meaty carcass.

To breed the CX pullets, I have to feed them separately from the others, otherwise the CX eat too much and die. Cockerels or cocks from other breeds must be removed from a breeding pen of CX pullets and fed back up to keep them healthy. Since a chicken stays fertile from a single breeding for several days, this is really not a problem, other than the extra effort and pen space needed. While I can't pen a bunch of males together, due to serious fights when one is put back after being used to breed, and I don't want to have to keep separate pens for each male, I can just pull a male from his regular breeding pen and put him over the CX for a couple of days; for maximum fertility I can use a few different males in rotation, and return them to their regular harem with heavier, higher protein feed. This can keep the CX under a male at all times.

wouldn't suprise me to see the poor heat tollerence in your Amer/ CX chicks coming from the Amer side as well. The pair I got from you had poor heat resistance, as did their offspring. I lost nearly every Ameraucana bird from you, and their offspring in the last 2 weeks-- and didn't lose a single Cornish. I think I have one pure Amer chick left.

 

[Totalcolour]

wouldn't suprise me to see the poor heat tollerence in your Amer/ CX chicks coming from the Amer side as well. The pair I got from you had poor heat resistance, as did their offspring. I lost nearly every Ameraucana bird from you, and their offspring in the last 2 weeks-- and didn't lose a single Cornish. I think I have one pure Amer chick left.

Well, here in WA state we don't have much heat, so that wouldn't be a problem. For us it's more the nasty cold damp stuff. We only get a few days in the summer around 90 ish.

So, I think I'm going to try the Cornish, Barnevelder Ameraucana thing, and maybe buy a couple of those white ones to see what I can do.

This is so much fun huh!

 

[Cedarknob]

This is so much fun huh!

Being able to enjoy it along with putting meat in the freezer makes breeding our own worth while.

 

[Totalcolour]

Being able to enjoy it along with putting meat in the freezer makes breeding our own worth while.

On top of growing it for us humans, I have a dog on a mostly raw diet, so it gets expensive. Growing my own gives her good quality meat at a fraction of the price, and she gets eggs daily too.

And culls and roos we don't need.

 

[Totalcolour]

So, I got five Barnevelder pullets and a cockerel yesterday. I was really very surprised at how big and stocky their legs are, like a cornish. The lacing is very similar too. The head is quite different; the comb is big and single and the eyes are gentle, not like the hooded Cornish, but I think the cross is going to be very nice. These pullets are quite heavy too, except for one slightly smaller one.

So, now I have to get himself to make me a breeding pen to keep the birds separate so I can keep track of them. Also probably a good idea to put leg bands on I think.

Oh, and she brought 18 hatching eggs too - BONUS!

 

[Minniechickmama]

I would say you did quite well for yourself. I have some Barnie eggs in that are due to hatch in about a week. I have 4 out in the coop and pasture too. I hatched 4 and got 3 cockerels and a pullet. I may loose two of the cockerels though, something is happening with them that I can't seem to explain and I want to find out what it happening. I treated one for toxins, but I am not sure if that is really the problem or not. The other is just limping, but I can't seem to figure out why. He also had a lump in his foot that I opened and treated yesterday, but that is on the other foot. I hate when crazy crap happens and I can't find the answer to it!

 

[enel 1]

Well, here in WA state we don't have much heat, so that wouldn't be a problem. For us it's more the nasty cold damp stuff. We only get a few days in the summer around 90 ish.

So, I think I'm going to try the Cornish, Barnevelder Ameraucana thing, and maybe buy a couple of those white ones to see what I can do.

This is so much fun huh!

I grew up in Sumner (lake tapps) and I didnt think it got to hot in washington either...untill I moved east,now I live in the far s.w. corner of the state in a area known as "Hells Gate" on the Snake river and we havn't had temps below 90 with temps up to 112 for 3 weeks now.Some times I miss the temps back home but I love the blue skies over here.

 

[Totalcolour]

I would say you did quite well for yourself. I have some Barnie eggs in that are due to hatch in about a week. I have 4 out in the coop and pasture too. I hatched 4 and got 3 cockerels and a pullet. I may loose two of the cockerels though, something is happening with them that I can't seem to explain and I want to find out what it happening. I treated one for toxins, but I am not sure if that is really the problem or not. The other is just limping, but I can't seem to figure out why. He also had a lump in his foot that I opened and treated yesterday, but that is on the other foot. I hate when crazy crap happens and I can't find the answer to it!

A couple of mine have lumps on the feet. They are still in quarantine so treating them is not too hard. I may have to cull one - she doesn't seem to be improving, and seems really to be getting much worse. Can't stand to see them hurting.

The cockerel though is fabulous! And, I'm starting to get anxious, lock-down in 6 days! I'm sort of hoping I don't get a 100% hatch (what would I do with 18 more babies

) So far, Himself hasn't complained. Well, he can't really, he has over 110 ducks out there (and there's still about 30 in brooders).

We have a big "contraption" (actually it was a crow trap that didn't work) that I'm hoping he will convert into a run and coop for my other birds. I'll give the Am/Maran/Cornish cockerel 3 or 4 hens in the new area and then the Barnies can have the meadow.

Aaarrgh, frick, I'm getting addicted. I sold nearly all my chickens, I was down to five and now see what's happening. I saw Barnies and just "HAD" to have some.