Unknown Rooster

[melinda342]

I do not have a picyure of my rooster but i found 1 on the internet he looks like ecxcept his tail feathers are shorter. please help.

 

[hennyannie]

The one pictured looks like a white leghorn to me.

 

[melinda342]

so would mine be the same even though his tail feathers are shorter? they are the same style though.

 

[donrae]

If your roo is solid white, large comb, white earlobes, yellow legs, kinda lean build, he's a leghorn.

 

[melinda342]

he is not al all lean, but i heard these chickens we got for an ag project at school were genetically modified/engineered to grow fast and get really fat, so they do not live long. What is the average lifespan of a chicken though?

 

[ChickyLaura]

It sounds like you have a cornish cross, meatbird. They are for eating, and don't live long due to their rapid weight gain.

 

[gryeyes]

Uh, then you don't have a Leghorn. There are a couple breeds specifically bred for meat production that do as you were told by the ag folks. THOSE birds generally die long before they are 18 months old, because they are bred to be processed at less than six months of age, having reached the size they need to be. They often die of heart attacks because they cannot carry their bulk (and legs give out, too).

The life span of a regular chicken, not one bred for rapid growth, can be as much as 10 years, although most don't make it that long due to mishap. There are members here who have 14 year old chickens.....

A lot of people think chickens only live 2 - 3 years, because that's they're best laying years. Chicken factories cull their stock around 2 years of age, because egg production falls off afterwards, but old hens can lay eggs as long as they live. Just not very often.

 

[melinda342]

the ag teachers did not tell us this. a girl at a show learned this herself and told us. so if i did not feed him too much and kept his weight down, would he live longer?

 

[donrae]

Some folks here have had success with limiting feed and encouraging foraging and have had cornish crosses live 2-3 years. It's pretty rare, though. They're pretty much a self-terminating breed.