Ramblings of a newbie starting a self-sustaining meat bird flock…

[imacowgirl2]

Starting a thread to keep track of my progress with my meat bird flock…

I started with New Hampshires from Henry Noll’s line from Freedom Ranger hatchery in August 2022 after reading of numerous people’s success with the birds here on the forums. I had a batch of 15 ordered, and due to early losses (my fault, not the hatchery fault), ended up with 3 in the freezer, 3 hens held back for breeding, and 2 roosters held back for breeding.

Because I wasn’t going to have enough birds from my own flock to refill the freezer this spring, I ordered another batch from Freedom Ranger in January 2023, hatch date 1/16/23, and currently have 18 of them getting close to processing. I am also going to hold about 4-5 hens from this group back for breeding.

Most exciting is that we have our first two chicks from our birds hatched and in the brooder: (The black one is an australorp chick from our laying flock)

I have two hens of laying age (had to cull the other one for crop issues — she had a wad of long grass in her crop when I processed her) and 1 rooster, and am seeing almost 100% fertility on the eggs we are still eating, so that alleviates the concern I have been asked about by numerous people whether the roosters get too big to breed…apparently not, or if they do, it’s later in life.

Short term goals:
1. Do some crazy studying up in next few weeks to help me determine how to best choose who to cull and who to keep. I did a little bit of reading last time but just ended up going by solely weight at butchering age.
2. Learn how to wing band…I’ve been interested in it for awhile, especially now that our current birds are starting to lose leg bands more frequently. I think solid ID of birds will be key moving forward as I start to learn how to better select for the traits I want.
3. Figure out a good method of record keeping…and figure out what data I need to keep record of.

Mid-range goals:
1. Raise 50%+ of chicken we consume within 3 years
2. Become better educated about various breeding methods for selecting for specific traits.

Long term goals:
1. Raise 100% of the chicken we consume within 5 years

 

[FunClucks]

Following. Would love to hear how these turn out for you, as far as development, management style, meat growth, processing time, etc. I've been eyeing these for a while and am really interested in whether these might work for me too.

 

[imacowgirl2]

Following. Would love to hear how these turn out for you, as far as development, management style, meat growth, processing time, etc. I've been eyeing these for a while and am really interested in whether these might work for me too.

Definitely!! I was REALLY happy with the first batch of these I did, we ended up with 2 of the 3 birds being right at/over 4.5-5 lbs dressed at 13 week butchering age. This batch did battle some coccidiosis so I think we will probably be going an extra week or two with them to get those weights. I plan on weighing some tomorrow or the next day since we are approaching the 12 week mark.

This time I did also feed meat bird crumble almost exclusively - last batch only had all flock pellets (after chick starter) because I didn’t even think about feeding meat bird feed. I had intended to keep track of feed consumption but my daughter accidentally fed meat bird feed to the layer flock for almost a week, and then we ran out of meat bird feed unexpectedly so the meat birds ate all flock a couple days…so there is no saving that math

 

[HenriettaPizzaNolan]

Also following this because I hope to have a dual purpose flock one day, once we are able to move somewhere with more land and no rooster restriction. These New Hampshires look good and there are also a few other dual purpose breeds I'm interested in, like McMurray's Delawares.

With these, have you had enough broodies to hatch eggs, or did you have to incubate? Also, how much did the ones you processed weigh?

 

[Mwhit]

Looks like a great set of goals. Excited to see how they work out for you. I’m doing a similar thing with my FR New Hampshire’s.

I processed all but a cockerel and 4 pullets with the plan to keep hatching meat birds. I kept the second heaviest male who had more of lighter golden coloring. The first had walked too much like a cx with all its weight forward.

Are your hens looking too fat at this stage?

 

[imacowgirl2]

Also following this because I hope to have a dual purpose flock one day, once we are able to move somewhere with more land and no rooster restriction. These New Hampshires look good and there are also a few other dual purpose breeds I'm interested in, like McMurray's Delawares.

With these, have you had enough broodies to hatch eggs, or did you have to incubate? Also, how much did the ones you processed weigh?

So far neither of my hens has gone broody, but this breed/line has a reputation for doing so, so I’m hoping it’s just a matter of time.

Right now I’m trying to determine if both my hens are even laying. I thought they were both laying, but then my young ones turned into bratty little egg eaters about a week ago, so I have the hens separated right now to collect eggs that will go in the incubator or under a broody (the laying flock has a few ladies going broody, so they’re going to do the work for me if my meat hens don’t go broody in time).

The ones I processed last time had live weights of 6-9.5 lbs and processed weights of 3.6-5.5 lbs; however, I used two different scales, and I don’t think the one for processed weights was completely accurate - all three birds looked and felt bigger than the 4.5-5 lb birds I get from the store, so I’m pretty sure they were all at least 4.5 lbs processed. I’ve got new weighing methods and scale for this go around, so I’m interested to see what they are this time.

 

[imacowgirl2]

Are your hens looking too fat at this stage?

They’re definitely heavier than my laying flock (which includes buff Orpington, barred rock, and australorp, along with leghorns) but they don’t appear to be obese. They get around well, forage when allowed out to free range, and don’t just lay around. I was actually worried about my rooster getting too big too, but so far he is also doing well. The one thing I’ve noticed, is their crops do appear much larger in the evening than the other birds’ in the laying flock. I’m keeping an eye on this after losing that third hen who had a bunch of long grass wadded up in hers when I processed her.

 

[imacowgirl2]

For anyone else interested in these birds, I will note…this January batch is notably different than the batch from last August in that the birds are showing a lot more variation. Not necessarily in meat/table traits, but in things like feather color, size variation between the individual birds, etc. So nothing to necessarily detract from the table quality, but possibly suggesting that the overall breeding flock is not as uniform/being selected for certain qualities as much as it once was. Or maybe I just happened to get a really uniform batch last time?

 

[HenriettaPizzaNolan]

So far neither of my hens has gone broody, but this breed/line has a reputation for doing so, so I’m hoping it’s just a matter of time.

Right now I’m trying to determine if both my hens are even laying. I thought they were both laying, but then my young ones turned into bratty little egg eaters about a week ago, so I have the hens separated right now to collect eggs that will go in the incubator or under a broody (the laying flock has a few ladies going broody, so they’re going to do the work for me if my meat hens don’t go broody in time).

The ones I processed last time had live weights of 6-9.5 lbs and processed weights of 3.6-5.5 lbs; however, I used two different scales, and I don’t think the one for processed weights was completely accurate - all three birds looked and felt bigger than the 4.5-5 lb birds I get from the store, so I’m pretty sure they were all at least 4.5 lbs processed. I’ve got new weighing methods and scale for this go around, so I’m interested to see what they are this time.

Those weights sound nice! Congrats

And I'm sorry to hear you have an egg eater. She may need to go in the stew pot if the usual tricks don't work lol. That's just bad luck though. You have so few hens and one turns out to be an egg eater! I'm sure you already know this stuff but make sure she's getting enough calcium and protein, and throw some fake eggs or golf balls in the nest. That's always my first course of action and then there are other steps you can take after that.

 

[imacowgirl2]

Those weights sound nice! Congrats

And I'm sorry to hear you have an egg eater. She may need to go in the stew pot if the usual tricks don't work lol. That's just bad luck though. You have so few hens and one turns out to be an egg eater! I'm sure you already know this stuff but make sure she's getting enough calcium and protein, and throw some fake eggs or golf balls in the nest. That's always my first course of action and then there are other steps you can take after that.

I actually don’t think it’s one of the hens…I think it’s one (or more) of the current growers headed to freezer camp in a few weeks — we didn’t have any issues until last week or the week before. Hoping it’s one of the growers anyways, I’m about to find out either way lol.