Selecting Breeders at 22 Weeks

Went over my Partridge Chantecler roosters today, picked out 5 keepers and plan to butcher the rest on Monday. They are 22 weeks old. Is this old enough to make the last call? I just don't want to end up trying to re-attach severed heads; way easier to just leave them on a bit longer.

My picks weighed from 5 1/2 to 6 pounds. Does anyone know if this is on target for this age?

Samwise, I think this is a very interesting question. I think it totally depends on the breed. Are they slow to mature or quick? The buckeyes are an extremely slow to mature bird, which makes it really hard to pick the ones to keep. I know that I didn't get around to choosing which cockerels to keep until they were about 28 weeks old. By this time they had a decent carcass too. Now the buff orpingtons, they are 17 weeks old, pretty easy to see who is going to be some of the keepers, I have 6 to choose from and there are a couple that are certainly smaller. There will be others that will chime in, perhaps chantecler owners. But you have indeed posed an extremely stuff-to-think-about question. I would love to hear too.

I do recall, somewhere in those deep cobwebs of my mind that I was reading something (and who knows where, maybe even on our forum), that this fellow didn't do his final choosing until the roosters were about a year, and he never chose the ones that matured the fastest. Don't pay too much mind to this statement, as it is only something that stuck out in my head. Hope you get a good answer. Have a wonderful day, CynthiaM.

.

samwise, I usually go by feathering when butchering my PC. When they are fully feathered, not showing any pin feathers or new feathers coming in, I butcher them. I have them seperate from the others and fatten them up a bit with no free range for awhile. I found this year the whites take a little longer than the PC to get `plump`.
I found my PC last year, very nice eating birds that were easy to pluck, dispite the dark feathers. It sounds like yours may need a little more time, don`t be afraid to give it to them if you have the room.
I hope this may have helped a bit. Let us know what you decide and how it goes.

Cynthia, I'm not really sure how the PC's compare with other breeds for speed of maturity. I've never done any breeding before or even paid very much attention to my chickens once they were old enough to fend for themselves.

Cynthia & reneggaide, I think you're right about not choosing the fastest maturing. I'm thinking they would tend not to be the heaviest birds in the end either. At least, I had such an example in my flock. Earlier on he was one of the best, maybe the best. Now some of the others have far surpassed his size and breadth. Also at that time his comb looked perfect, but I had read enough not to be surprised when it got all big and lumpy later.

coopslave, my birds are pretty well feathered although many of the feathers, especially hackle, are still growing. I do need to thin the ranks however and already have help lined up for Monday so it's too late to back out entirely, but maybe I'll go back and reselect a little more leniently, giving preference to the ones with broad backs and deep chests that have potential to fill out more.

You say your birds 'were easy to pluck, dispite the dark feathers'. I've read about this before, about a white bird creating a more desirable carcass, and I didn't understand why. So do dark feathers actually tend to pull harder or what exactly is the difference(and how does it work)? Pardon my childish curiosity but I'd really like to get that cleared up.

You know, it depends on what you are breeding for. If you are breeding for meat quailitys you should pick the largest/fastest growing one. If you are breeding for show points, i say you should do one at 35-45 weeks and then a final one at 56 weeks (or final weight depeding on breed.

For an example i would probley make my very last cull on my yellows at about 35-45 weeks.

I am fairly new to butchering for our own consumption so I am going by what I heard and my own personal experiences.
I have been told that dark feathered birds do not pluck as `clean` as a white or light feathered bird. That there are dark spots and feather shafts left over that some people find unapealing.
My first butcher last year of PC had none of that and a very clean carcass. The whites were just as good as the PC this year. I am very careful to make sure that all the feathers are in though, I think pin feathers will give you trouble.
Here are some of the PCs done last year. I did post a thread about it in ACE and I can`t remember how old they were but I believe they were over 20 weeks. They were actually pretty fast maturing compared to the line I hatched this year. The fellows this year have taken a long time to fill out and become fully feathered.

You're probably right about the pin feathers. In my limited experience they are a pain to get out. Oh well, too late now. Live and learn. And plan ahead better next time.

Some nice birds you got there. Don't think mine are as plump as that yet. By chance do you remember any weights, live or dressed?

Here is the thread.
http://albertachickensetc.punbb-hosting.com/viewtopic.php?id=15977

Good news ! Talked to my people and was able to reschedule to Nov. 11. Hopefully that gives them enough time to fill out a bit and grow out those feathers.

Well the boys' grace period expired today. They're all tucked into their little plastic sleeping bags where they will be hibernating through the winter months. Three of us (one experienced and two not) did twenty roosters and a couple pullets in about seven hours. The heaviest bird was 4.23lb, not real impressive, and that was with feet, gizzard, liver, heart and all. The pin feathers still weren't all grown out, but I didn't want to postpone till December, help would be hard to get and I've already been feeding the birds for the past month without seeing any weight gain. Still, I'm really happy to have all that homegrown chicken in the freezer and I think we all had a great time. I'm excited for next year when I will hopefully be doing my own hatching, which will be much earlier than May and should give me better weights by the end of the season.