Yard Bird

Here's a look at one of our best birds so far. This was a New Hampshire hen processed at about 14 weeks. We have decided that, while I love a pure breed, a cross that includes a cornish rooster is most likely going to be our next attempt at a good meat bird. The commercial poultry industry uses the cornish rock cross in producing a large bird in a five week period. This is accomplished by the genetic ability of the bird to efficiently convert feed into muscle coupled with high-protein feed, antibiotics, and hormones. We want to try to use the cornish rooster to cross with our early maturing New Hampshire hens in hopes to obtain a good foraging bird, that matures early and has a good meat carcass. This will also allow us to hatch our own birds here on the farm instead of ordering a batch of meat birds.