AlbertaChickensEtc

Wow those cornish are BIG!! We butchered most of our roosters and they are about the same or bigger then the rooster in the picture. Our setup is much tinier. Only one killing cone (that my dad made) and a piece of plywood on straw bales. And the most we did in a day was 5! i like those PVC cutters. Better then trying to find a joint with a knife or hacking away with a hatchet.

Okay, that is just sad - the difference between the Cornish roaster and the rooster. I am almost afraid to think of what my 20 week old Brahmas and Dark Cornish will look like without feathers. They ate like little pigs, had a great summer running around, and that is all we are going to get????      Thank goodness we didn't plan on selling any this year. It would be too embarrassing.

I do hope that my Bourbons look a little plumper at Xmas. They are only about 12 pounds now. Maybe I should stop the free ranging exercise so they can fatten up? 

That is a great set up Jayme. It looks efficient and fast.

Is there a butchering 101 course anywhere?

Roosters do serve their purpose here. We keep the legs, thighs, wings and breast meat. Package 1 1/2 birds per bag and it is a good meal. I just wanted to show everyone that roosters will never amount to the cornish, but if you prefer not to have birds with issues like leg problems and heart problems then roosters will fit the bill. They are just not as pretty packaged up like the "Store looking" birds.

Generally the Cornish Giants are the faster birds, and the cornish crosses are a bit slower to mature but have less problems. We only lost 6 of 100 meat birds to natural causes (2 others were runts that we did away with and the other 3 were victims to our cat).
We feed them starter for 2 weeks, grower for 2 1/2 weeks and then a grain ration mixed with finisher for the remaining weeks, they are also out on grass in their chicken tractor and moved daily for the first couple weeks then twice daily for the last couple when they really start getting messy. It works very well, they are very healthy birds and this last batch grew very even. We had a few woppers at 8 lbs and a few smaller at the 5 1/2 lbs but mostly they averaged around the 6-6 1/2 lb range at 10 weeks old. (We did 20 larger ones at 8 weeks that were 6 lbs).
The broilers are on a natural light schedule and we never take their food away, seems to work well for them.

I find that last picture VERY interesting.   Are there any heritage birds where the Rooster even approaches the weight of a cornish?  No wonder our heritage breeds are dying out.  Nothing can compare to that weight difference.  It makes half the heritage breeds we produce almost useless.  Unless I have a Japanese chicken sexer working for me, why should I feed half my chickens who will turn out to be roos all that food for such little gain in muscle mass.

Sue

LOL, Jayme when you emailed me that day I thought you were doing in your lovely aussie ducks...for a few seconds i was VERY confused, LOL!

Prairie we did our roosters for the first time (well, paid someone else to).  Heritage breed, they ended up about 6 lbs dressed.  Legs are nice and there is enough breast.  They can't compare but waste not want not.  I haven't tried roasting one yet..just crock pot and souped it.

ranchcookie wrote:

okay, i have a silly question    how do you get their legs all nicely tucked in like that???  i couldnt for the life of me get my turkey's legs all in, so they look a little silly in their bags...

and are those the giants or the crosses?

I'd like to hear that too, my turkey legs were so long I had the most horrible time to try and wrap the birds up, oh brother.  Have a wonderful day, CynthiaM.