Happy Mother's Day!
I butchered the first of my CornishX last night to put on the grill. Man, oh man! I seriously miscalculated the size of a milk jug in comparison to the size of those guys. It barely went past his shoulders, so to speak. Like The Hulk in a crop top. It did help keep him calm while I carried him upside down to my table to tie him up. For a while at least. I learned I need to practice tying my knots better and faster. For the others, the feed bag will have to do.
I was impressed not only with the size of this 10-week cockerel, but the fact that plucking was a breeze compared to the cockerel culls I butchered last year. I tell you this chicken was nearly the size of a small turkey. It was getting late, or I would have weighed him before I threw his butterflied carcass on the grill. He fed the three of us last night and there are enough leftovers for two more meals plus a soup pot of stock.
I was offered a few guinea eggs to hatch, so I got an incubator set up and running. My 80 year old Father-in-law picked them up and left them on my kitchen table. When I got home from work I found 48 guinea eggs on my table. My incubator only holds 42. I had 3 eggs that I had collected from my pair of guineas plus the 48 on the table. I fired up another incubator/hatching box and set all 51 eggs. That was 11 days ago, and after candling them last night 44 are developing nicely. 5 were not fertile and 2 had blood rings. The guy who GAVE them to me said he had found 1 nest in the woods with one of his guinea hens on it. All 48 eggs came from one nest. I was very surprised that so many were good... pleasantly surprised.
