The 2024 Cornish Cross Project

For those who follow, each year we purchase and raise day old chicks of the Cornish Cross variety.  Generally, in eight short (or long, depending on how you look at it) weeks, the birds will weigh six pounds and yield a four pound carcass.  We butcher them and have chickens to eat for most of the year until its time to do it again.  On March 23rd we purchased all the birds that our local Tractor Supply Company had.  That totaled 7 birds.  Purchasing this way rather than by mail saved shipping costs.  The birds were $2.99 a piece.  Big problem, however.  Seven birds in the freezer are not going to make many gumbos, fricassees, or chicken and dumpling meals. 

Chickens already under the heat lamp

The kind lady informed us that they had more coming in on Wednesday, March 27th.  On my way through town at noon, I passed by and snatched up all the Cornish Cross meat birds that they had delivered.  That totaled 25 birds.  So if we can keep them all alive, we'll have 32 in the freezer.  That sounds better.  I picked up two boxes of birds - 12 in one and 13 in the other.

Two boxes of chicks

I have a great old college buddy who is from Michigan.  I envied him for the snow that he always saw growing up in the north.  He always told me snow was great for about the first week - pretty, white, and picturesque.  And then, it turns ugly and dirty.

That's a good description of day old chicks as you see in the unboxing photo below.  The chicks are yellow and cute.  They are at their zenith.  Enjoy the photogenic moment while you can, because they change.  Quickly.  They get big and dirty and gross, to be honest.

Day old chicks

We put the day old chicks under the heat lamp and the seven (one is hiding) chicks we got initially moved out of the garage and onto green grass on a beautiful day.  We like to get them outside as quickly as possible.  They start eating grass and bugs almost immediately.

Pastured Poultry from week 1

So each year, on a weekly basis, we put the chicks on a scale to chart their growth.  I put some old rags on top of the kitchen scale to protect its cleanliness, zero out the scale and put one of the chicks on top.

Cheep! Cheep! Cheep!

And here's the verdict on day one of having the 25 birds home.  The average bird weighs 3.5 ounces.

So a quarter of a pound, basically, at day one.  In addition to grass, we feed them an 18% protein chick starter.  Oh, something else, too.  Right now, in our area, we have an influx of big beetles.  I call them June bugs, but it's not June and I don't think that's their proper name.  At night, they are attracted to the outside lights.  I catch handfuls of them and toss them to the chicks.  They instinctually know they are food and they run around, snatching them up in their little beaks and then run away so the others don't steal their meal.

Next week we'll see how much they've grown.