This spring I purchased some meat birds from a local hatchery. Just butchered all the roosters but kept 4 hens. I am pretty sure they are RIR. My friend gace me a cornish cross rooster and I was thinking of trying to cross them and see what kinda meat/bird I will get. Anyone ever do this? Will the cornish get to big and not be able to breed the hens?

-- tracy (murfette@stargate.net), September 08, 2001

Answers

I'm not an expert on this or anything but I have had RIRs and Cornish crosses. Never tried breeding them but....who knows! I have read however, (and experienced) that they will grow too large for breeding purposes. We kept a Cornish X hen for about 5 months and she got HUGE so I'm sure that the roosters would do the same. This year I got RIRs and Barred Rocks, which are supposed to be an excellent meat bird too, and I plan on trying to cross the two of them to see what we get. Good luck!

-- Lisa (tepeeclan@nidlink.com), September 08, 2001.

Rhode Island Reds are a pure bred variety but the typical Cornish Cross is a three or four way cross depending on who you got them from. The results of breeding them with the RIR's or even with each other is very likely to give you a range of birds.

This isn't to say it can't be done but you'll likely find it necessary to do some thorough selecting and culling to get a desirable strain of birds.

={(Oak)-

-- Live Oak (oneliveoak@yahoo.com), September 08, 2001.