The Grand Experiment

[Chickenheadmate]

Two questions:
1. Is it better to grow slow and finish fast or vice versa?
2. Why wouldn't 300 every 5 weeks be worth it for them? That's a lot of birds

There are several different strains of CX. The cobb500 and Ross708 are both slower growing birds that do better on grass. Cobb500s grow out fast early but slow down in the end and Ross708s start slow and then speed up in the end. Most hatcheries and feed stores just buy CX with no idea what strain they are. Most hatcheries who can provide specific strains aren't interested in dealing with the quantities that we buy. I actually had one hatchery who shall remain nameless tell me that if I wanted 300 birds every five weeks spring through fall, that I just wasn't worth their time and effort.

 

[rjohns39]

1. Don't know yet, but hopefully will at the end of this.
2. Some of the hatcheries only service BIG customers. They generally have a minimum order of 1000 birds.

 

[rjohns39]

10/6/2018: Ross took about 28 oz of feed and cobbs 24 oz. Lost another Cobb over night and have one that's acting lethargic. No apparent reason for the loss. Checked all the butts and only one Ross had pasty butt, all cleaned up and running around. Only a few have figured out the meal worms are a treat and run to them.

 

[rjohns39]

Well, the lethargic cobb has moved to the ER suite and has food, fresh water and nutri-drench water. I'm thinking he over heated. I had to dip his beak to get him to drink, then he crawled into the water bowl and started drinking on his own. He's now going back and forth, big gulp of water and then a big gulp of nutri-drench water.

It's 103* out there right now and even with all the fans on, the brooder is still really hot. And to make it much worse, we're dipping into the low 60's over night. They say this hot streak should end in just a few days. But they've been saying that for 3 weeks.

 

[aart]

Maybe Sav-A-Chick electrolytes instead of nutridrench?

 

[rjohns39]

Well, the little cobb didn't make it through the night. I don't raise meat birds in July and August because the heat is just too much. I didn't expect October to be this hot.

 

[Chickenheadmate]

Well, the little cobb didn't make it through the night. I don't raise meat birds in July and August because the heat is just too much. I didn't expect October to be this hot.

Bummer.
I live in Texas and It's not anywhere near as hot.where do you live?

 

[HuffleClaw]

How many chicks are left? (I wasn’t getting notifications)

 

[Mosey2003]

I had been meaning to weigh feed and feed out a batch of chicks just to see for my own figuring whether I felt it was worth feeding chicks out or not, I'm glad you're saving me the trouble I still need to do that with dual purpose though.

 

[rjohns39]

I'm down 3 cobb, but I think they gave me a couple extra so still around 38-40 cobb and all the Ross. They move too fast to count.