Chickens for 10-20 years or more? Pull up a rockin' chair and lay some wisdom on us!

[centrarchid]

Walt,
Your observations are still a function of your system of confinement as all your arrangements as indicated had a pen of some sort. I challenge you to take your most dead game cock and hen and next spring place them on a walk like OT game cockers used to do when making numbers using matings of known quality. Then relate to us the following fall what happens in respect to how hen(s) treat offspring. I think even your deadest games will prove model parents and exhibit behaviors you have never seen before. A lot of knowledge concerning American games and poultry in general is lost because all the confinement in use that is a neccessity when large numbers of animals are needed and available land resources are limited.

Some non-game critters I work with would be dead game based on your partial description where they will kill anything they are confined even if it results in no offspring without my intervention. My definition of game means will not giver up fight even when all hope of winning / survival is lost which at one time was working definition for dead game, not the apparent management nightmare than can persist when birds can otherwise be confined individually.

 

[centrarchid]

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Much of the poultry stuff is innaccurate gtgo be sure. Some of the information in wikipedia is sound and serves as good starting point that others not in know can use to initiate a better search. Those better articles, which there are many, are usually posted by parties trying and often having appropriate knowledge levels to succeede. It appears somebody or somebodies need to do same with respect to low tech backyard poultry production. Such an effort would fix problem so many are complaining about. If this is done, then such a wiki article could provide more accurate source of information than any poultry books currently in print.

 

[navasima]

NEW TOPIC: What would be the suggestion for a sustainable, small meat flock? Small = 4-6 total adult birds OR - Would it just be better to get Cornish cross chicks and stock the freezer once a year? The priority goal is quality meat, though when is cost not a factor?

 

[Ridgerunner]

I have not read that Wikioedia article in question because I see no reason to. That is not the point of my post.

Just because an article is in Wikipedia does not make it inaccurate. I have read several that were accurate and well-written. I've also read some I consider inaccurate. I do not automatically believe everything in Wikilpedia is wrong because a few articles are. I do not automatically believe anything I read on the internet no matter the source. I've seen articles on extension web sites that I consider rubbish. I've seen things in this thread that are rubbish. I've seen things in this thread that are very good.

 

[fowlman01]

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Game is bred into these birds and in the case of the Orientals, it is centuries of honing that behavior. I didn't say that weren't good mothers, they are excellent mothers.
Explain to me why the chicks start to kill each other at 4 weeks. These chicks have plenty of space and if they turn that is the end of the fight. They go to it toe to toe and one or both will end up dead without intervention.

Domestic chickens are confined..thats why they are called domestic chickens. They have to be confined in some way to survive. I don't know what game cockers do.... all I see is little huts with chickens tied to them. I don't take challenges online.

Walt

 

[galanie]

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Doesn't mean it's accurate either. It's just too unreliable to trust without further research. Which sort of defeats the purpose of using it as a source. Old Timer's wisdom. Using your experience for advice, not that of others. What part of that is unclear?

 

[MedChicken]

It seems like this has devolved into fighting over the behavior of game cocks and the accuracy of wikipedia articles. It seems counter-productive. Could we get back to practical tips and information for the newbies among us? Thanks!

 

[navasima]

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Any ideas please?

 

[perchie.girl]

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I am not an OT but it would seem logical to raise up your own if you were doing the sustainable meat flock. Something dual purpose that wouldn't suffer if you decided to keep the best ones for sustaining the flock.

deb

 

[Ridgerunner]

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What do you mean by "sustainable"? To me, that is kind of a nebulous term. Also, what do you mean by "quality" meat? My idea of quality meat leans toward chickens old enough to have flavor, but those are too old and tough to fry. Some people would not consider my chickens to produce quality meat.

If pure cost is your factor, Cornish Cross is the way to go if you are feeding them. Their feed to meat conversion is pretty hard to beat if you are buying their feed, even if you have to pay for chicks. Make one big order and fill your freezer. If you free range your flock to the point they forage for practically all their feed, the equation changes.

I usually overwinter 6 or 7 hens and one rooster. Using an incubator and any broodies I get, I hatch 40 to 45 dual purpose mutt chicks a year, mainly for meat. I eat males and females. Does not matter. They get a lot of their feed from foraging.

The problem with keeping so few chickens and hatching so few is that I quickly lose genetic diversity in my flock. About every three years, I get hatching eggs from somewhere or new chicks formn a hatchery to get new blood into my flock. I don't hatch enough chicks to be "sustainable".