05/07/2026
🐤 All about our Cornish 🐥
Rocky here, the boss, general manger & supervisor.
We just wanted to pop in and talk about one well like our favourite Cornish aka broilers aka meat birds.
We just put out our April 7th hatch babies yesterday. Finally temperatures allowed it. No freezing at night, rain or snow. And double digits for days.
I love this old little tractor it’s perfect to introduce a small amount of chicks to outside at a time.
I had only kept 20 for myself to raise out of this hatch because I was sick with influenza and decided that’s how many I could manage at the time.
Well my husband did slightly overfeeding them and I probably did too. Around 3 weeks they were really big, like too big. I had one with leg issues :( So I pulled back a feeder. After a week what an improvement.
See I don’t really measure my feed… 🫣😬 but we feed twice a day. Morning and evening and this prepares them for the feeding schedule on pasture.
I want to avoid issues like heart failure, water belly, (ascites), I want nice active birds. They are very much bred to gain fast and have a good feed conversion. That’s one of the reasons I raise them & love them. But they do required patience and attention to catch things before they happen.
The other little ounce of prevention that I use is medicated starter. It contains a minuscule amount of Amprolium which is NOT an antibiotic, steroid, it could be compared to a dewormer.
Coccidiosis is in the environment. It is a Protozoa (kind of like a worm or bacteria). It loves heat and moisture. It gets ingested by chicks replicates in the stomach and spread through f***s.
Because Cornish are eating, drinking pooping machines, cases of coccidiosis are more prevalent.
Coccidiosis attacks the lining of the stomach and makes the chicks very ill and they eventually die without intervention which involves Amprolium or another treatment in higher doses requiring a withdrawal time.
Once my Cornish go onto pasture I mix in their medicated starter with plain grower for about a week as well. I also give them probiotics to help give them healthy gut flora to help kick start their immune systems for when they come into contact with the outside microbes.
Keep the environment dry, clean; this goes a long way with Cornish.
This is how our season is going so far. Hopefully night time temperatures continue to cooperate and I can’t believe I’m going to say it: a little drizzle of rain wouldn’t hurt!
Happy chickening everyone!
