The Cornish Cross: “What is wrong with this picture?!” There is so much to think about in this arti

[WalkingOnSunshine]

I also prefer the flavour of pastured birds. I pasture raise my CX, did you not see me mention that?

Please choose to educate yourself before sharing facts that are not true.

They have the SAME flavour as a heritage bird when raised in the same conditions. They just grow to a butcher weight 5 times as fast so you can process them before puberty strikes and toughens the meat.

I can't agree more. We grow the CX for flavor as well as efficiency and tenderness. They taste the same as my DP cockerels, that take twice as long to get to a decent weight. Here are a couple of mine. You'll notice that they are not sitting in a feed bowl, but up and wandering around.

 

[WalkingOnSunshine]

I contacted the author of the ariticle I posted. I wanted to know what he is doing now since writing his article. This is what he says.
I hope users of BYC will read this response. It was nice of him to respond to my questions.

It was nice of him to respond. I would like to take on a couple of his points, however. He says it's better to have birds that totally free range and eat plants, berries, etc with no supplemental feed. How many back yard chicken owners have the space to supply any kind of chicken--DP or CX--with all the feed they need without buying feed? How many can afford to tear up the sod and plant the nutritious plants that the chickens would need? There is no way for any chicken to live solely off the land in a typical backyard. None of my chickens--not even the layers--could live off the land on my property because the grasses, etc. that grow there aren't nutritious enough for them. I also don't expect my horses to go without grain, or my goats to go through the winter without some hay.

Also, many people here at BYC have carefully fed CX hens to keep them from growing too fast, and have mated them and had offspring. And it's not such a big deal that CX won't broody. I have lots of different kinds of chickens for different purposes, and that seems to make the most sense. People rail against monoculture in fields; why is a "monoculture" of chickens any better? Different breeds are for different purposes. It makes a lot of sense to keep some for egg laying, some for eating, and some for brooding and let each breed do what it's best at. I don't expect a Basset Hound to guard chickens any more than I expect a Great Pyrenees to track game.

 

[aoxa]

I contacted the author of the ariticle I posted. I wanted to know what he is doing now since writing his article. This is what he says.
I hope users of BYC will read this response. It was nice of him to respond to my questions.

I guess I'm done trying to prove to you that this article is experience and not fact. All the pictures posted.. all the videos, and experience in raising them a totally different way than the author of the article.

You are not looking past your opinion. I was in your place not too long ago, disgusted by the CX. I was informed that there ARE other ways to raise them.

As to his response about the eggs: Again, wrong. I mentioned my very FIRST comment on this thread that my CX Big Bertha is laying jumbo eggs 4-5 days a week. The biggest eggs in my flock! She started at 18 weeks. Now if that is not a decent age to start laying, I don't know what is



my CX were raised on a diet of 70% forage, 30% supplemented feed once they were 2 weeks old. I know of one lady in particular who raises CX through the summer and doesn't feed them at all! I just don't feel comfortable withholding feed from my entire flock.

If you have ample free range room, the CX can live without any feed at all after a certain age. They do need adequate nutrition as chicks, as do all breeds of chicks. They can go broody, they can raise their own young.

I guess I will just take MY positive experience elsewhere, as it's not wanted here.

 

[aoxa]

It was nice of him to respond. I would like to take on a couple of his points, however. He says it's better to have birds that totally free range and eat plants, berries, etc with no supplemental feed. How many back yard chicken owners have the space to supply any kind of chicken--DP or CX--with all the feed they need without buying feed? How many can afford to tear up the sod and plant the nutritious plants that the chickens would need? There is no way for any chicken to live solely off the land in a typical backyard. None of my chickens--not even the layers--could live off the land on my property because the grasses, etc. that grow there aren't nutritious enough for them. I also don't expect my horses to go without grain, or my goats to go through the winter without some hay.

Also, many people here at BYC have carefully fed CX hens to keep them from growing too fast, and have mated them and had offspring. And it's not such a big deal that CX won't broody. I have lots of different kinds of chickens for different purposes, and that seems to make the most sense. People rail against monoculture in fields; why is a "monoculture" of chickens any better? Different breeds are for different purposes. It makes a lot of sense to keep some for egg laying, some for eating, and some for brooding and let each breed do what it's best at. I don't expect a Basset Hound to guard chickens any more than I expect a Great Pyrenees to track game.

Actually WalkingOnSunshine, they can go broody Delisha on here has many broody CX. She did mention they are more apt to break eggs because of their size, and clumsiness, but they can be wonderful and dedicated mothers.

 

[WalkingOnSunshine]

Actually WalkingOnSunshine, they can go broody Delisha on here has many broody CX. She did mention they are more apt to break eggs because of their size, and clumsiness, but they can be wonderful and dedicated mothers.

Well there you go. Just one more reason that I think the author of the originally posted article should have tried raising CX a few different ways before concluding that they were an abomination. Seems like even a tiny bit of asking around would have served him well.

BTW, aoxa--I'm curious. Do you feed your CX different feed from the rest of your flock? I see them wandering around with the layers and wonder how you do that. I wouldn't be comfortable with my CX trying my high perches, for instance, but it would be nice to not have to separate them into a different pasture.

 

[aoxa]

Well there you go. Just one more reason that I think the author of the originally posted article should have tried raising CX a few different ways before concluding that they were an abomination. Seems like even a tiny bit of asking around would have served him well.

BTW, aoxa--I'm curious. Do you feed your CX different feed from the rest of your flock? I see them wandering around with the layers and wonder how you do that. I wouldn't be comfortable with my CX trying my high perches, for instance, but it would be nice to not have to separate them into a different pasture.

They were raised with them since chicks. I have a ladder roost with very deep bedding, so they have soft landings. I did run over one CX with a dolly full of feed and broke her foot, and jammed one in a door by accident, but those are the only two issues I had with legs.

I feed all of my birds the same way. The struggle was having enough feeder space for everyone. I ended up feeding directly on the ground spread out so they could all get to it and fill their crops twice a day.




I don't think anyone is starving

Here they are turning up the deep litter for me with some BOSS, oats, barley and wheat.

 

[mg15]

That makes no sense. Of course one state will be the largest producer. That's the way math works. If Iowa wasn't the largest producer, another state would be. Even if there were no large laying houses at all, one state would still produce more eggs than another, and be the largest producer. If Iowa stopped producing eggs tomorrow, my state of Ohio would then be the #1 producer. What's your point?

Monoliths--I don't think this word means what you think it means. Iowa does not have one monolithic laying house.

Hi, here is the meaning, Websters,
Full Definition of MONOLITH

1
: a single great stone often in the form of an obelisk or column
2
: a massive structure
3
: an organized whole that acts as a single unified powerful or influential force
See monolith defined for English-language learners »

See monolith defined for kids »​

Examples of MONOLITH

1. The new office building is a massive steel and concrete monolith.
2. The media monolith owns a number of networks.

These examples of words Scale, monolith, are to convey a cerebral sense to expand our views to see what could be.

 

[WalkingOnSunshine]

Hi, here is the meaning, Websters,
Full Definition of MONOLITH

1
: a single great stone often in the form of an obelisk or column

2
: a massive structure
3
: an organized whole that acts as a single unified powerful or influential force
See monolith defined for English-language learners »

See monolith defined for kids »​

Examples of MONOLITH

1. The new office building is a massive steel and concrete monolith.
2. The media monolith owns a number of networks.

These examples of words Scale, monolith, are to convey a cerebral sense to expand our views to see what could be.

Yes, you've reinforced for me that I know the definition of monolith. The state of Iowa is not a monolithic egg producer. I suppose if the State of Iowa owned all those farms and produced all those eggs, then your use of the word would be correct. But it doesn't. Perhaps a company such as Egglands Best could be described as a monolithic company, but you weren't using the word that way and Iowa has many different farms producing eggs.

I guess what's confused me most about your posts is this: what's your problem with Iowa? Why is it bad that one state produces the most eggs in the country? Doesn't SOME state have to be #1?

 

[mg15]

This quote sums up the whole picture: Response of Tim Rinne's letter (below).
from Chuck Porter, Unadilla NE
Thank you very much for sharing the op-ed. Tim did an excellent job of succinctly stating the dire straits our food system has sailed into. The Johnson County scenario he used as an anecdote has become impossible due to many variables. Some of the causes are obvious.... globalization of the food system. focus on commodity production versus focus on local food security and health, near-sighted and technologically-optimistic industrial-scale ag practices, etc, but there are other related causes that contribute just as significanlty.... an entertainment-and-sports-centric culture, a lack of appreciation for and continuation of practical skills teaching, an idiotic belief that physical labor is to be avoided unless proven unavoidable, and a large-scale betrayal of rural America by established "experts" that farm-raised food is dangerous to consume and less appealing than Hot Pockets at home and nuke-and-serve meals at Applebees.

I wish I could say Tim's letter is a brilliant wake up call. However, the plain truth is that his concerns (and those of Lord Cameron) have been articulated for decades by hundreds and thousands of Real Food apologists, and there are plenty of great examples from those same apologists of better ways to raise food and provide for strong communities. But, on the whole, it seems that a catastrophe is the only thing that will wake up the sleeping giant that is the United States. It is a hard pill to swallow by ecological and sustainable agriculture practitioners that we have been viewed on the whole as just a bunch of Chicken Littles. But, as Tim Rinne reminds me in his op-ed, the sky IS falling. Too bad all of us are under the same sky.

Chuck Porter
Unadilla, NE
_____________________________________________________________________
Mr. Porter is responding to this op-ed
Local View: Getting back to local food
BY TIM RINNE
How embarrassing.
Here I am, a lifelong resident of one of the premier agricultural regions of the world, whose family has farmed in the state since 1868, and I didn’t get it.
You would have thought that eating at least three times a day for 50 years would have stirred me to take an interest in how that food got on my plate.
But no. I just ate.
It took a quote from an aristocratic British farmer (a member of the House of Lords, no less) to get me to grasp not just the centrality of food production in our lives — but how fragile this system is.
“Nine meals away from anarchy” is how Lord Cameron of Dillington described Britain in 2007.
The first time I came across this statement I wasn’t even sure I knew what he was talking about. But the inspiration for his disquieting comment comes, in part, from our side of the pond. From the experience of Hurricane Katrina.
Our grocery stores (where most of us do all of our ‘hunting and fishing and farming’) operate on what is called ‘just in time delivery.’ Your average grocery outlet carries just three days of inventory — the equivalent of ‘nine meals.’ Any disruption to that delivery schedule and our food security is at risk.
Hurricane Katrina, Lord Cameron declared, provided a textbook case of the social disruption that occurs with a sudden calamity. The first day (meals 1-3), people rush to the grocery store to stock up. The second day (meals 4-6), those who can afford it go back and buy whatever’s left. And the third day (meals 7-9), when the larder’s empty and people are hungry, the social order begins to break down.
Or, in Lord Cameron’s words, “there will be rats, mayhem, and maybe even murder.”
Scarcity does ugly things to a population. “The better angels of our nature” (to use Abraham Lincoln’s phrase) tend not to fare very well when people are hungry and afraid. Our first thoughts are for ourselves and our own, and conflict invariably erupts with our neighbors over competition for resources. The Pentagon, in fact, already is bracing for wars over food and water — and not just in the poor nations of the globe. As Lord Cameron warns, everyone who eats is vulnerable to food insecurity. It’s a world we want to avoid if we can help it.
So to bring this all back home, we need to be asking where that food on our grocery store shelves comes from.
And the answer for more than 90 percent of it is: from somewhere other than Nebraska.
Agricultural powerhouse that we are, barely a tenth of what we grow in the state is consumed locally. The other nine-tenths is exported to out-of-state markets.
It hasn’t of course always been that way. My father assures me that, growing up on the farm in Johnson County in the 1930s, 95 percent of their diet came from within 5 miles of where they lived. They had to buy their coffee and sugar. And they never had fresh strawberries in December. But they ate three times a day and they could tell you where their food came from — because they either grew it themselves or got it from a neighbor.
That kind of food localization is something we need to get back to, particularly those of us living in towns and cities where the single-largest irrigated crop in America is grown: our lawns.
We can’t eat the grass they’re made of. They sap enormous amounts of water, fossil fuels and arable land. But we religiously nurture them in our yards, while the average bite of food on our plate travels 1,500 miles or more.
This is a recipe for disaster. And with the increased risk that extreme weather events like drought and flood pose to agriculture because of climate change, we frankly have no choice but to develop a more stable — and locally based — food system.
In April of this year, yet another British government official, Agriculture Minister David Heath, warned of coming food shortages and exhorted Britons to replace their lawns with gardens and “dig for survival.”
Call me overly cautious, but I’m taking the minister’s advice. I don’t like missing meals. It makes me crabby.
Tim Rinne is the state coordinator of Nebraskans for Peace. He and his wife, Kay Walter, have converted their entire property in the Hawley Historic District to an ‘edible landscape.’
http://journalstar.com/news/opinion...cle_a4e0da8a-d4db-5ad5-a441-4753052a756b.html

--
Tim Rinne

 

[punk-a-doodle]

For those that find the taste of pastured Cornish Xs and DPs are the same, is anyone able to post comparison photos of the drumsticks? I have bought chickens from several sources now that raise their Xs and DPs in the same fields, using the same techniques, same butcher date. The drumsticks on the Xs have always been paler with a different taste and texture (one I find less pleasant and less complex and rich). Blind taste tests with chef panels seem to point to noticeable taste differences as well, and butchering photos show differences such as enlarged organs even in pastured Xs. I'm curious if anyone has been able to get a more comparable look to the meat and organs? I'm not sure if they necessarily relate to flavor, but flavors can not be shared online so I'd at least be curious if anyone got the carcass to look more similar in those two areas.

As a side note, I had one Naked Neck once that tasted more like a Cornish X. The other NNs I've eaten were not bland like that one. No idea what that was about.