My sis always lets her guinea fowl hatch their own eggs, but then she steals the babies away to a brooder as soon as she can. The death rate is staggering if she doesn't do that.
I am just thrilled. The Country Gentleman corn I planted on Sat is up. Can yo believe is? 4 days!!! Whhoottt!!!
I have been lightly watering twice a day and keeping my eye on things. This morning when I was watering I noticed it. Sure enough tiny little green spears about 2 inches tall all the way down the row.
I brood my poults myself, but i do like to use a mama to do the incubating when available.
So far this year, I have lost 4 turkeys. 1 Royal Palm, 2 bourbon Reds (1 right after hatch) and 1 blue slate.
We're selling off a bunch of the poultry to cut back on the feed bill, and when I asked E if we could let one breed of turkey go, he almost had heart failure
Hopefully by the end of June I will only have Sumatras, BLRW, two groups of bantams, and the turkeys. And I guess the mallards (though they are the most disrespectful and annoying ducks ever!)
we got "red broilers" from Ideal one year - just about the same thing. we really loved them - they were more chicken like and we still have 2 of the hens!!! after 2 years (or is this 3??) they never flopped over dead and act like regular layers - not as productive and heavier, but they look like chickens.
so
Who has experience with these birds??
me me me! well just about the same. you might price the Ideal birds - they could be cheaper.
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How long till processing??
Web site states 5 - 6 lbs in 9 to 11 wks.
we let ours go for longer - i got nervous about them dying but like the hens (above) they didnt. and we didnt have any losses.
How hardy are they?
they did great. kept them in the shade and on grass and they even free ranged a good bit. they at a lot tho.
Do they tolerate heat?
we have hot summers and they did just fine
How did you like them?
really loved them and would highly recommend. we got the creepy meats at the feed store so it was just cheaper/easier to do it that way. and we wanted some quick food - so it worked out for us to do creepy ones again. the red broilers were more like chickens. some of the males even started to crow and act like roosters. we even had one roo that had the leg thing - we called him Legs and we finally culled him but he was too creepy to eat.
the big difference that i noticed is that the creepy meats (cornish x's) have the bigger breast. the broilers were meaty for sure - with huge legs and thighs. and they were more "normal" to butcher. the creepy meats are so young they basically fall apart.