Sustainability of meat chickens
Unless you raise your own
meat birds (often called "broilers"), you
have probably only eaten one kind of chicken in your life --- Cornish
Cross. This hybrid is a wonder of modern breeding since it can
reach a
carcass size of nearly nine pounds in just eight weeks. The
Cornish Cross
also has a lower feed
conversion rate
than any other variety of chicken, which means you give the
birds less grain for every pound of weight they put on --- a boon for
your wallet and for the environment.
Homesteaders groan about
the Cornish Cross because of the multitude of
health problems that come along with their rapid weight gain, but what
prevented me from raising these efficient birds is their proprietary
genetics. Not only is the Cornish Cross a hybrid, the parent
lines are
owned by corporations, so the only possible way to get Cornish Cross
chickens is to buy the chicks from a hatchery. I want our flock
to be
as self-sufficient as possible, and that means raising our own chicks,
so Cornish Cross are off the table, as are other hybrid broiler
varieties like Freedom Rangers.
On the other hand, there are two
problems with raising heirloom chickens for meat, and
both are so serious that you probably won't find heirlooom broilers for
sale even at the
farmer's market. The first problem is aesthetics. Since we
all grew up with big, plump-breasted chickens on our plates, we think
that heirloom chickens
look odd, with their big thighs sticking out and their skinny
breasts.
I crunched some numbers from one of our batches of Black Australorps
and discovered that they gave me twice as much dark meat as light meat,
which would be a problem if I was afraid of animal fats. Luckily,
I
believe that fat from pastured animals is good for me, so I cherish
both light and dark meat from our homegrown birds.
The second problem with
heirloom chickens is the real sticking point
--- feed conversion rate. The chicken industry claims that
factory-farmed Cornish Cross chickens have a feed to meat conversion
rate of 2:1 meaning that you feed the chickens two pounds of feed and
get back one pound of meat (and bones.) Third party studies of
pastured Cornish Cross chickens report a rate of 3.5:1 at the best, so
this is what I'm aiming for. And I fell far, far short --- more
on that tomorrow.
This post is part of our 2011 Chicken Experiments lunchtime series.
Read all of the entries:
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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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The industry is lying when they say Cornish-Cross have a feed conversion of 2:1. I just raised 60 Cornish-Cross broilers and it was closer to 4:1. Don't get me wrong, they will eat like crazy. It's almost disturbing to see them literally swarm the food trough.
What was disappointing was how much raw grain and mash was in their manure. It simply passed through their bodies unused. I don't think I will raise the Cornish Cross again for broilers. I am interested in trying a batch of the Freedom Rangers.
I am very interested in your breed choices for a self-sustaining flock. Ultimately we will do the same.
I don't post comments much, but I love reading your blog daily.
Whit
Yeah, I kinda figured you should take the industry's figures with a grain of salt.
I do think that 3.5:1 is possible in optimal conditions (if the birds don't have to spend any energy walking to the feed trough or heating themselves up or cooling themselves down.) 4:1 is probably much more realistic for a backyard operation.
Thanks for commenting with your experience --- it's unusual to hear from another backyard broiler raiser who actually keep stats on feed to meat ratio!