# Trying some crosses



## BrandonM

I want to get:
Barred rock, white rock and dark cornish.
I want to free range so i should have a rooster. What breed should the rooster be?
What do these cross look like:
Barred rock x white rock
Barred rock x dark cornish
White rock x dark cornish


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## MaransGuy

If it was me I would get a Barred Rock rooster, but that's me.


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## BrandonM

Maransguy, i was thinking the same thing but just wanted some other peoples opinion


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## BrandonM

Should i get straight run 5 of each barred rock, white rock and dark cornish or 5 pullets of each and 1 rooster?


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## Bee

Five pullets of each and one rooster....a tiny bit more money but worth it in the long run. I'd use the heaviest breed rooster to cover your hens and that will be the White Rock, if you want meat and eggs genetics as opposed to eggs and eggs or meat and meat.

Here's the reason why I say this...the Cornish are known, primarily as meat, but not so much as egg. If you breed a meat rooster over meat hens, egg hens and dual purpose hens, you will take away the good laying characteristics of your layers and the attention will be more on meat.

The Barred Rock is more egg genetics than meat, so breeding over the egg and meat(DP), eggs(BR), and meatC), will likely produce more laying genetics than breeding the meat rooster~, the Cornish.

Breeding the egg and meat ~a true DP~WR over a meat, egg , and egg and meat flock will round out the meat hens into meat _and_ layers, will round out the egg hens into meat _and_ eggs and keep the egg and meat hens as egg and meat hens.

If your goals are a true DP flock, then breed your DP rooster over them. BR is too light weight to be a true DP and the Cornish is a true meat bird but not known for stellar laying, so that leaves your WR as the obvious choice.


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## BrandonM

Bee, i would do the white but i am also looking for pure breed barred rock.


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## BrandonM

Also a BR rooster with a WR hen will give you ghost barring, what about WR rooster with a BR hen?


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## Bee

I thought you were looking for DP qualities. My bad...you are wanting to create a breed? If so, that takes many years...many long years. 

Or stay true to breed SOP? If so, you'll want a rooster for each breed and you'll want heritage/breeder quality stock and not from hatchery.


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## MaransGuy

If you wan't full blooded poultry that you can hatch from of each breed then you would have to have a rooster for each breed and would also have to keep each breed separate. In my opinion, if you're wanting to let them all free range together and you wan't pure breed BR, I would get 5 pullets of each breed and get 1 rooster of the BR. But like I said earlier, that's my opinion.


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## BrandonM

Does it matter if one is the rooster and one is the hen? Does one sex carry more or less traits to the offspring than the other?


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## MaransGuy

Not that I know of. I'm not an expert, but a hen and a rooster of the same breed carries the same qualities as far as I know. I have a good bit more experience with chickens than most but there is still plenty of people out there that knows more than I do.


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## BrandonM

I am also looking mostly for egg laying but as an added bonus i would like it big and tasty for when i have cockerels and when hens stop laying.


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## MaransGuy

A cross from any of those three would make a nice eating chicken in my opinion.


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## WeeLittleChicken

Well the barred rock roosters are usually a lot sweeter. I hear Cornish roos tend to be little terrors. I love my two Cornish hens but I'm not sure I'd want their male counterpart trying to beat me up all the time. Seems like a headache to me. Plus a good rooster can last for a long time and if you're anything like me you'll probably get more attached to him then most of the hens. It's just a thought. I had brahma rock cross roosters that grew huge quick and were good eating. Their mothers, barred rocks, are amazing layers.


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## BuckeyeChickens

BrandonM said:


> I want to get:
> Barred rock, white rock and dark cornish.
> I want to free range so i should have a rooster. What breed should the rooster be?
> What do these cross look like:
> Barred rock x white rock
> Barred rock x dark cornish
> White rock x dark cornish


BrandonM, what are your goals exactly???

I have crossed a lot of different breeds over both Barred Rocks and Dark Cornish. Based on your post it sounds like you are only interested in "color" in the offspring but perhaps you have other goals in mind as well?!?!? Breeding ANYTHING to Dark Cornish reduces egg laying in the offspring but usually increases meat....I say usually because it also depends on where the parent stock originated (hatchery Dark Cornish are usually awful in more ways than one)!!!

By expressing your goals in more detail perhaps we can all be better informed and help you....This is why I ask the first question.....


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## BrandonM

I want a chicken with great egg laying, great meat and free range


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## BuckeyeChickens

BrandonM said:


> I want a chicken with great egg laying, great meat and free range


"Great" is a somewhat subjective term but I get what you are saying. First and foremost, proper selection within a "pure" breed can give you good results without cross breeding in many cases. For example when I got my first Buckeyes in 2002 I read they were "good layers". Mine were purchased from individual breeders, the major hatcheries did not have Buckeyes in 2002 and I was expecting "good layers" but what I really end up with were "terrible layers"!!! Having raise several other dual purpose breeds I even expected the Buckeye to be on par or equal to those but boy was I wrong. The Buckeyes I purchased were so bad I almost abandoned the breed entirely but decided I would work to improve their egg laying ability. After 3 years of working on them I went from what I called "terrible" to "good" and today most of my customers report "excellent" laying from the Buckeyes they get from me.

Proper selection in a breeding program is one of the key's to improving any trait or characteristic. Simple cross breeding isn't going to give you significant results right out of the gate. Most "good" dual purpose breeds will lay 210-220 eggs per year....the BEST egg layers (Leghorns and Australorps) are in the 300+ range and you just cant get there with "meat", too! As I stated in another post crossing Dark Cornish to any "good" egg layer will almost always result in lower egg production in the offspring. You need to establish a base line for what you consider "poor", "good" and "great" up front and select birds based on those parameters before you will know if you are getting the results! It takes a lot of time and data collection.


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## Bee

Excellent info! The only breed I've seen that even comes close to excellent lay and also having a truly meat build is the White Rock~but, as was stated, one needs to improve on the individual breed to have any success in that area.


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