So I Have decided to start breeding meat chickens

[LittleHillFarms]

I bought some Barred Rock hens and I am wondering what you guys think about my getting a leghorn roo to breed with them. Has anyone ever done this? does anyone have any other suggestions about what rooster to breed with these hens?

 

[sylviethecochin]

For meat? Not Leghorns. Or Plymouth Barred Rocks, unless you have heritage ones.

What are you looking for? Dual-purpose or just meat? There are a lot of available breeds, slow-growing, fast-growing... About the fastest growers you can get are Cornish X, and a popular slow-growing breed is the Freedom Ranger. White Rocks (related to Barred Rocks, but bred focusing on meat rather than on eggs) are something many meat breeds start with, and, of course, Bresse are the "high-end" meat chickens.

Honestly, your options are almost limitless, but it depends what you want. Plymouth Barred Rocks, however, are almost exclusively egg-laying chickens.

 

[Ridgerunner]

A lot depends on what you actually want out of meat chickens. Most people want size. Forget leghorns if size is important to you, leghorns are small and for egg laying, not meat. Early maturity is important to a lot of people, depending on what age you want to butcher them. Unless you want to wait until they are almost fully grown a Jersey Giant or Brahma is probably not a great choice, though some people are happy with them. Feather color is important to some people, a light colored bird (white or buff) gives you a prettier carcass before you cook them if you pluck. With Barred Rock you will have some dark feathers which would not bother me.

I don't know where you are or what options are available to you as to which rooster. You might find your state or country thread and chat with your neighbors about what is available. Or you can look through the Henderson Breed Chart to see how big the breed is supposed to grow and if they are early maturing. You can see what they look like in Feathersite.

Henderson’s Breed Chart

http://www.sagehenfarmlodi.com/chooks/chooks.html

Feathersite

http://www.feathersite.com/Poultry/BRKPoultryPage.html#Chickens

With most black and red roosters, Barred Rock hens will give you black sex link chicks. The males will hatch with a spot on their heads while the females will not have that spot. It's kind of neat and can be important to some people.

There are all kinds of options for you. Off the top of my head I'd look at New Hampshire, Delaware, any of the Rock's or Wyandottes, Chantecler, Dorking, or Buckeye. A true Cornish might be a good choice, not the Cornish Cross but a true Cornish. I think any of these would be a good starting point for you. As you learn you can refine your choices. Nothing ever works out as you plan it so you have to be flexible and learn as you go.

Good luck!

 

[Compost King]

If I were to do a long term meat bird breeding project I would start with Leghorn male, sounds silly at first but I theorize that after many generations I would come up with a Decent Meat bird. If I did this it would be done to learn since I do not see a profit in such a long process.

I would start with a Leghorn Roo over a Dorking hen (or any bird that has high meat qualities), all the females hatched would be rapid feathering, but not meat quality in size. However they would be better than a pure Leghorn with the same rapid feathering. A male rapid Feathering chicken will pass this on to the females.

Next I would breed the females from that cross to a Male leghorn again, since both would be rapid feathering the males and the females would be rapid feathering.

Take a male from that cross and breed it to another high quality heritage meat bird, this time lets say its a Bresse. Repeat the same process. Keep doing this with a different High Quality meat bird. Heritage Cornish, Brahama, Buckeye, New Hampshire, Delaware etc

I have no idea if it would work out but when I have leghorns in the future I might do this just see if eventually I can get that rapid feathering gene as far removed from a Leghorns frame. If I learn enough about breeding at that point I would try to stabilize the best traits I created for meat. Likely I would pass the birds on to someone who knows what they are doing since I did the long term part of isolating the Rapid Feathering from a small frame bird.

Some will say "why not just get New Hampshire Red or Delaware since they feather rapidly" ... and my answer is, I won't learn anything using someone elses work, I need to make my own to learn.

If anyone knows of a breed that feathers more rapidly than a Leghorn let me know. The only thing I know is that when I had leghorns and other breeds in the brooder at the same time the first few weeks I assumed the Leghorns were going to be biggest birds, then they start laying as the others are starting to get bigger than them. Not much meat on them at all but they do have rapid growth and maturity.

Other thoughts I had is that my Red Rangers were only a week behind the Leghorns as far as the date of their first egg being laid. Maybe starting with a Red Ranger Roos or another meat hybrid would be better but I being stubborn I might do this with a leghorn. If this fails then I would have created some really good laying hens which is never a bad thing.

 

[pintail_drake2004]

I have some hatchery BR and BO that are pretty large. I recently processed all of my red rangers from my summer meat pen, except one gentle rooster. I plan to cross him over some of my larger birds and see if I can line breed a quick growing, fuller breasted bird. I'm not trying to re-invent the wheel, but I'm working with what I already have. The RR were 12 weeks at butcher, and weighted 8-9lbs.

 

[Compost King]

I just hatched out Ayam Cemani over Red Rangers for my first attempt to make a unique meat bird. I am hoping it makes a decent sized black meat bird.

 

[LittleHillFarms]

I am looking for a first generation meat bird I bought some barred rock chickens that have been bred for meat. locally there are lots of leghorns and that is why I though leghorns would be good but I don't want to buy a leghorn if they would not make a good x

 

[rjohns39]

@duluthralphie how long did it take you to develop your Toads? and Which thread is the one where you did it?

 

[Compost King]

if you are you looking for first generation results then I would not use Leghorns, but I highly recommend them for egg production and low feed intake. Best breed I ever had for eggs.

 

[Cluckerzfamilyfarm]

Have you thought about a Sussex instead of leghorn? Or maybe an austra white? Leghorn just isnt the best option in my opinion