Building a chicken army
Why: In the vineyard we use chickens to control pests, so we don't have to use insecticides. This can be dangerous though as hawks and other predators often see chickens as easy meals. Aside from bug control, chickens also fertilize and aerate the soil, adding nitrates and keeping soil health optimal.
Store bought chicken products come from commercial farms, and are very unhealthy, as they gorge on feed and are stationary/sedentary for their short lives. This creates toxins and high levels of Omega 6 Essential Fatty Acids (EFA). By using chickens to work for us, we can retire them with a party where they are the guest of honor. Chickens raised with an active lifestyle and balanced diet have a very different composition, and high levels of Omega 3 EFA.
Theory: Improve Feed Conversion Rate, generational improvement, decrease time to process of backyard chickens - pasture raised chickens. We need back yard chickens with aggressive appetites! Essentially we need to turn Commercial "Broilers" into foraging, healthy, backyard chickens that will roam the vineyard and keep it free of all bugs especially leaf skeletonizers. The theory started simply by observing Orpington chickens performing great work services, but rendering low FCR. When time to retire, the chickens would offer delicious, healthy meat, but not very much for the work put in processing their retirement paperwork. Observation of commercial broilers - hyper food aggression, wide frame, taller stature, but poor foraging and other natural skills. Observation, combining the two would create an ideal bird. Observation, there are opportunities to improve meat quality, improved sturdy frame, improved predator defense, improved breeding success, bring egg production to average (Orpington is medium and frequent, Broiler is extra large and every slow). If this works out, we would essentially be continuing to improve a Cornish and Plymouth Rock Hybrid where the Commercial indurstry stopped. This is not to say their strains are not ideal for their purposes, but this should be ideal for homesteaders for perpetual poultry production.
Work to date: Shortly after moving to our new location in 2022 we ordered Lavender Orpington chicks from a local farmer. We were happy with their work ethic, but they were easily damaged by aerial predators, and they did not had the appetite we needed. This pushed us to long nights of research, to which we found that the CornishX/Cornish Cross/Broiler had all the traits were were looking to add. However, they were so many negatives about that hybrid, that we decided to create our own strain, filtering for the traits we were seeking to get as close to the Cornish Cross Ross 308 and Cobb 500 Strains as possible. We picked up some Dark Cornish and White Plymouth Rock chicks and set about creating our Grand parent stock. We used the best quality Dark Cornish Rooster with Rocks to create best possible Cross. Raised Crosses, selecting fastest growing, largest framed, healthiest stock among other traits. Of those, I kept 2 of the best Roosters, and all of the hens. I kept 2 Lavender Orpington Roosters and all of the hens.
**I think because the quality of stock has improved since the CornishX Ross308/708 and Cobb500 projects started several decades ago, I was able to achieve similar results in almost no time at all, I also had a framework and knew what to build towards, without Aviagen, Cobb, Tyson and others, I would not have had the insights and research material needed to do this so easily**
Parent stock: Using the better of the 2 roosters and the other 2 as backups, I put the prime Cornish Rock (CR) rooster with the Lavender Orpington (LO) hens, and the prime LO rooster with the CR hens. The results were wide swinging, but mostly they were either small grey birds with gold accents or large gold birds with grey accents. We chose to pursue the large gold chicks Which is a Lavender Orpington Rooster over a Dark Cornish and White Plymouth Rock Hybrid. We raised the Pullets and Cockrels, observing them, and found they could be strengthened further by backcrossing to the CR Hybrid. We did this and the results were amazing, producing benefits we were not initially even looking for such as being able to easily identify sex by sight within one month (pullets are offwhite with black spots and dark grey feet, cockrels are all white with some small grey speckles in their feet) The Roosters and hens are, in essence, large orpingtons. They forage, are healthy, hardy, can withstand an aerial attack and lacerations, heal quickly from lacerations and attacks, produce large eggs frequently, the roosters are instinctive, but not aggressive, but overall more food aggressive than orpingtons. Ideal standard complete!
Breeding stock: To achieve the highest quality Rooster and Hen, I hatched over 500 birds on this project. The breeding stock was sent to a nearby farm for safe keeping and to raise under an unbiased observer. I have retained the parent and grand parent stock, however, in order to prove viability we will halt the project (10/1/2024) to replicate and fully document every date, weight, and trait.
Cajun ORC (Cajun Cross/Bayou Broiler) - Orpington - Rock - Cornish
Tandem Projects:
Royal Orpington -
Lavender Orpington Rooster over ORC hens
Giant ORC
Indio Gigante Roo over Jersey Giant hen
Jersey giant roo over Indio Gigante hen
Indio Giant + ORC
Goblin
Ayam Cemani + ORC
Abominations
Ayam Cemani over Indio Giant (see above)
Store bought chicken products come from commercial farms, and are very unhealthy, as they gorge on feed and are stationary/sedentary for their short lives. This creates toxins and high levels of Omega 6 Essential Fatty Acids (EFA). By using chickens to work for us, we can retire them with a party where they are the guest of honor. Chickens raised with an active lifestyle and balanced diet have a very different composition, and high levels of Omega 3 EFA.
Theory: Improve Feed Conversion Rate, generational improvement, decrease time to process of backyard chickens - pasture raised chickens. We need back yard chickens with aggressive appetites! Essentially we need to turn Commercial "Broilers" into foraging, healthy, backyard chickens that will roam the vineyard and keep it free of all bugs especially leaf skeletonizers. The theory started simply by observing Orpington chickens performing great work services, but rendering low FCR. When time to retire, the chickens would offer delicious, healthy meat, but not very much for the work put in processing their retirement paperwork. Observation of commercial broilers - hyper food aggression, wide frame, taller stature, but poor foraging and other natural skills. Observation, combining the two would create an ideal bird. Observation, there are opportunities to improve meat quality, improved sturdy frame, improved predator defense, improved breeding success, bring egg production to average (Orpington is medium and frequent, Broiler is extra large and every slow). If this works out, we would essentially be continuing to improve a Cornish and Plymouth Rock Hybrid where the Commercial indurstry stopped. This is not to say their strains are not ideal for their purposes, but this should be ideal for homesteaders for perpetual poultry production.
Work to date: Shortly after moving to our new location in 2022 we ordered Lavender Orpington chicks from a local farmer. We were happy with their work ethic, but they were easily damaged by aerial predators, and they did not had the appetite we needed. This pushed us to long nights of research, to which we found that the CornishX/Cornish Cross/Broiler had all the traits were were looking to add. However, they were so many negatives about that hybrid, that we decided to create our own strain, filtering for the traits we were seeking to get as close to the Cornish Cross Ross 308 and Cobb 500 Strains as possible. We picked up some Dark Cornish and White Plymouth Rock chicks and set about creating our Grand parent stock. We used the best quality Dark Cornish Rooster with Rocks to create best possible Cross. Raised Crosses, selecting fastest growing, largest framed, healthiest stock among other traits. Of those, I kept 2 of the best Roosters, and all of the hens. I kept 2 Lavender Orpington Roosters and all of the hens.
**I think because the quality of stock has improved since the CornishX Ross308/708 and Cobb500 projects started several decades ago, I was able to achieve similar results in almost no time at all, I also had a framework and knew what to build towards, without Aviagen, Cobb, Tyson and others, I would not have had the insights and research material needed to do this so easily**
Parent stock: Using the better of the 2 roosters and the other 2 as backups, I put the prime Cornish Rock (CR) rooster with the Lavender Orpington (LO) hens, and the prime LO rooster with the CR hens. The results were wide swinging, but mostly they were either small grey birds with gold accents or large gold birds with grey accents. We chose to pursue the large gold chicks Which is a Lavender Orpington Rooster over a Dark Cornish and White Plymouth Rock Hybrid. We raised the Pullets and Cockrels, observing them, and found they could be strengthened further by backcrossing to the CR Hybrid. We did this and the results were amazing, producing benefits we were not initially even looking for such as being able to easily identify sex by sight within one month (pullets are offwhite with black spots and dark grey feet, cockrels are all white with some small grey speckles in their feet) The Roosters and hens are, in essence, large orpingtons. They forage, are healthy, hardy, can withstand an aerial attack and lacerations, heal quickly from lacerations and attacks, produce large eggs frequently, the roosters are instinctive, but not aggressive, but overall more food aggressive than orpingtons. Ideal standard complete!
Breeding stock: To achieve the highest quality Rooster and Hen, I hatched over 500 birds on this project. The breeding stock was sent to a nearby farm for safe keeping and to raise under an unbiased observer. I have retained the parent and grand parent stock, however, in order to prove viability we will halt the project (10/1/2024) to replicate and fully document every date, weight, and trait.
Cajun ORC (Cajun Cross/Bayou Broiler) - Orpington - Rock - Cornish
Tandem Projects:
Royal Orpington -
Lavender Orpington Rooster over ORC hens
Giant ORC
Indio Gigante Roo over Jersey Giant hen
Jersey giant roo over Indio Gigante hen
Indio Giant + ORC
Goblin
Ayam Cemani + ORC
Abominations
Ayam Cemani over Indio Giant (see above)
