[Alex_]

Hello Everyone,
Anybody got any ideas for a white meat bird that isnt a chicken? I can't keep cockrells here due to noise so i was looking for quieter alternatives.
Any suggestions would be great

    

[Womble]

Geese - Nope
Turkeys - Nope
White ducks - Maybe?
Peafowl - 

However, if you buy in something like hubbard broiler chickens as day olds, they'll be ready for killing before the boys start making noise. Personally I'd try that and see how it goes first, before trying anything more exotic.

[Eve]

What size animal were you thinking of?

Why white meat? Is it the flavour (I sooo dislike game whilst hubby loves it so chickens work for us as he gets the free rangers' legs ).

[waterbuffalofarmer]

what about grouse/pheasant?

[macgro7]

Hello Everyone,
Anybody got any ideas for a white meat bird that isnt a chicken? I can't keep cockrells here due to noise so i was looking for quieter alternatives.
Any suggestions would be great

    

Turkeys have loads of meat on them and are SLIGHTLY less noisy, but take more space. Guinea fowl? Noisy as well but at least don't crow in the morning.
I personally think the best white meat, identical in taste to chicken is from... young rabbits! We have rabbits, ducks, muscovy ducks, geese and chickens.
Rabbits are the cheapest to feed - I feed them rabbit pellets, hay and brambles! In fact when I tried feeding them only brambles they actually put on weight! In summer I keep some on grass in a cage with wire floor which I move two- three times a day. They breed fast, take care of their young so no incubators or brooders and are ready for slaughter in 2 months. Also no plucking feathers, which makes butchering much easier.
But that's only if you can kill bunny rabbits - not everyone can - that's the only downfall.
And as I said - young rabbits taste exactly like chicken. When you let them grow older they taste more rabbity

[Alex_]

Thanks for the response everyone.
i was after white meat as we eat a lot of chicken. Rabbits sound like a good idea

[Dave C]

Guinea fowl are s nice light meat and very chicken like.
You can get meat hybrids as well.
Mine are not noisy at all as long as there happy, although they are still inside.

Another thing could be buying game from a local shoot after October, we give everyone a brace of birds then the rest goes to the game dealer.
But we only get 30p a pheasant from him and there real nice eating, if someone was to offer us more we would take it as it £££ for feeding the birds through the winter.
We get a bit more for Ducks , partridge, hares and the likes but not much more.

[Eve]

Macro7, that's very interesting, how do you keep and despatch your rabbits? Do you keep a specific breed?

[macgro7]

Macro7, that's very interesting, how do you keep and despatch your rabbits? Do you keep a specific breed?

I'll take some pics today.
I bought a roll of 1x1/2 inch wire and made cages with wire bottom so all the poor falls down and I don't have to clean them!
Cages stand on a construction made of pallets, and poo gets composted right underneath. Chickens have access to it so they keep scratching and improving the compost.
Every doe gets a 2x3 foot cage to herself.
At the moment I have beveren, chinchilla and blue silver fox - all fairly large, fast growing meaty breeds. However I am looking for new zealand does and a buck as they have more meat on them and grow even faster than the ones I have.
Every doe can have a litter of 2-12 every 6-8 weeks. Babies are ready for slaughter at 8-10 weeks old, weighing around 2kg.
That's a lot of rabbit meat!

[Eve]

   That's a lot of meat indeed! How do you cull them - riffle?


I'll need to look into the care of them, we're lucky that we already have a 25sqm run that's rat proof inc the floor so no digging out 

[BrimwoodFarm]

Macro7, that's very interesting, how do you keep and despatch your rabbits? Do you keep a specific breed?

I'll take some pics today.
I bought a roll of 1x1/2 inch wire and made cages with wire bottom so all the poor falls down and I don't have to clean them!
Cages stand on a construction made of pallets, and poo gets composted right underneath. Chickens have access to it so they keep scratching and improving the compost.
Every doe gets a 2x3 foot cage to herself.
At the moment I have beveren, chinchilla and blue silver fox - all fairly large, fast growing meaty breeds. However I am looking for new zealand does and a buck as they have more meat on them and grow even faster than the ones I have.
Every doe can have a litter of 2-12 every 6-8 weeks. Babies are ready for slaughter at 8-10 weeks old, weighing around 2kg.
That's a lot of rabbit meat!

This is super interesting! I'd not thought about rabbit meat before. Going to investigate!

[clydesdaleclopper]

I believe [member=29031]JulieWall[/member] keeps NZ rabbits for meat

[macgro7]

At 8-10 weeks old they should weigh about 2kg and around 50% of that should be edible.
Another fantastic fact about the bunnies is that they are much more efficient than other grass eating animals.
According to some sources (not sure how reliable though) rabbit can produce up to 6 times the amount of meat as cow would on the same amount of food and water.
That means rabbit are better for the environment, they are quiet, take very little space and you can sell excess stock to other breeders or for pets! No cph or any other documents needed. You are legally allowed to dispatch them at home, so no need to drive or pay the slaughter house.
I think they are brilliant lol
You can even have them in London in a terraced house and no one will know!

[Hevxxx99]

I've often wondered about raising pheasants for meat, like chicken: ie no release and shooting bit.  I imagine they'd be less gamey than the released, semi-wild types that gamekeepers produce.

[BrimwoodFarm]

At 8-10 weeks old they should weigh about 2kg and around 50% of that should be edible.
Another fantastic fact about the bunnies is that they are much more efficient than other grass eating animals.
According to some sources (not sure how reliable though) rabbit can produce up to 6 times the amount of meat as cow would on the same amount of food and water.
That means rabbit are better for the environment, they are quiet, take very little space and you can sell excess stock to other breeders or for pets! No cph or any other documents needed. You are legally allowed to dispatch them at home, so no need to drive or pay the slaughter house.
I think they are brilliant lol
You can even have them in London in a terraced house and no one will know!

This is why I'm really interested. I'm in a terrace at the moment and have 30ish hens which are dual purpose. However, it'd be great to supplement the chicken with rabbit too.