Dorking meat birds

[hunterlj]

all the Dorking I received from Ideal ended up dying very young, out of 4 of them 2 died in the brooder, 1 died shortly after going to the coop, and 1 died around 3 months old. In every case they just slowly got weaker and slower than the other chicks and eventually ended up dead. I suspect inbreeding lead to a weak immune system and my lack of experience dealing with illness in birds are the reason. I bought 3 dorkings from a local breeder recently and all 3 are healthy but not breeding age just yet. I want the females to hatch chicks for me, and the male will be breeding with the Female dorkings and Red Rangers. If I ever get decent Delaware and NH Reds I will cross those with the dorkings too and see if I can get high quality meat faster. I would even be willing to cross the Dorking with CornishX if I end up with any I keep for breeding. I hope my dorking male likes fat chicks lol.

Please post your experience breeding them when they are old enough. Lots of pictures too! I want other people to be able to find the info they need. I know I haven’t been able to find much on these guys. Crosses welcome too!

 

[Compost King]

I will do that, I received my first dorking in Late April of this year, all of those died but I bought more in June that were about the same age. They won't be breeding until next year because these chickens mature slow. I am hoping that my female go broody next spring.

 

[hunterlj]

So I ended up butchering one of my younger cockerels yesterday. As they get older I’m watching them and deciding which one I want to keep. I have two left now to choose from and I’m going to let them get a bit older before I choose. The one I butchered was about 13.5 weeks old. I was pretty surprised about the amount of meat on him at such a young age. I don’t have a scale to weigh him but I’ll post some pictures of the carcass. Warning some of the pictures are a little graphic. I apologize the pictures may not be the best quality but I want to give you guys a rough idea of how this one looked.

 

[hunterlj]

Looks a little rough but I don’t have a plucker or anything so we just did the best we could. Still a few little black spots from where some of the feathers were still developing. I’m hoping that when I butcher the next one a little older his feathers won’t leave any little black spots. I think this one came out alright though.

 

[Chickenheadmate]

Looks a little rough but I don’t have a plucker or anything so we just did the best we could. Still a few little black spots from where some of the feathers were still developing. I’m hoping that when I butcher the next one a little older his feathers won’t leave any little black spots. I think this one came out alright though.

What did you feed him? And was it a free range bird or was he penned up?

 

[hunterlj]

What did you feed him? And was it a free range bird or was he penned up?

He was free ranged most of the time. I started with the 24% protein Dumor non medicated chick starter then switched him over to a 20% non medicated flock raiser at about 9/10 weeks.

 

[Compost King]

Hunterlj I noticed the right breast had a lump, My dorking Cockerel/Rooster also had the same lump when I felt his breast a few days ago. I was worried it was abnormal but after seeing your picture I am a bit relieved.

 

[hunterlj]

Nope just the crop! Hadn’t taken it out yet in those pictures outside.

 

[Compost King]

So when I feel a soft squishy lump on one side of his breast that is a the crop? I never felt other birds because i never planned on eating them or their offspring, I was worried it was some sort of illness starting to manifest.

 

[ijon]

Good looking bird.