Mandelyn Makes A Flock Visit-Part 1

This episode features a discussion between John Gunterman, Rip Stalvey and Mandelyn Royal about her visit to a poultry farm as a mentor. They discuss the farm's flock issues, culling, and potential solutions for improving the quality of the birds, with a focus on meat production for commercial purposes.

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Transcript

John Gunterman: 0:00

Hi, I'm John Gunterman, and I want to welcome you to another episode of the Poultry Keepers Podcast. Joining me in the studio are Mandelyn Royal and Rip Stalvey, the rest of our podcast team, and we're looking forward to visiting with you and talking poultry from feathers to function. Have you ever wondered what it would be like to have a mentor going over your whole flock with you? Coming up in this episode, Mandelyn shares her experience from visiting a farm and doing just that. Mandelyn, what is it that caused you to get in the car and drive four hours north to see someone that you'd never met before and look at their chickens?

Mandelyn Royal: 0:46

It started online. A lot of poultry interactions can. And it was the perceived level of commitment that I was seeing her put into her flock. Like she genuinely wanted to do the right things and was looking for that good, strong start to get going. So when she started seeing flock problems and when she started having some second guessing going on, I was like I should probably get the car and go up there and see what's really going on. And so we waited until the birds were at point of lay. And some of the issues, even though we had talked stuff out and she made some changes, some of it was still persisting. So it really was time for me to get up there and really get a feel for what was going on.

John Gunterman: 1:33

Is this a new flock? Is this new genetics that just came on the property or she had them for a little while?

Mandelyn Royal: 1:39

So she started early in the spring for a commitment of 90 chicks, and that should have had a pretty promising start in there.

John Gunterman: 1:48

You just gave me goosebumps. Somebody's been listening.

Mandelyn Royal: 1:51

If you start with 90, you ought to be able to find, 9 chicks.

John Gunterman: 1:55

At least 10 chicks, I would say, out of that at the end of the year that are good enough. Yeah,

Mandelyn Royal: 1:59

15, 20 if you're lucky.

Rip Stalvey: 2:01

Yeah, that old Rule of 10 is coming to play there.

John Gunterman: 2:04

Yeah. And the nice full freezer. So what were they experiencing though?

Mandelyn Royal: 2:08

Initially, the first big problem that presented itself was a little bit of overstocking after the brooder, when they went into the tractors the stocking rate was more aligned with commercial hybrids than a bird that's built to range. Which these birds were built to range, but the tractors moved daily and they still had a high rate of aggression going on, but developmentally they had some stuff going on like the third batch of chicks, cause she was smart and didn't bring them all at once. She wanted to. Slow it down and just do 30 at a time and that third Go ahead, Rip.

Rip Stalvey: 2:48

I was just gonna say I don't care who this person was or even what breed it was, but I really would like to learn more about What you saw and what you experienced there.

Mandelyn Royal: 3:01

Yeah, so what I saw was some slight evidence of slipwing and she had culled a bunch before I even got there. Once we realized there is a pen crowding issue, she addressed it within that week and went through and called more than half of them and she kept me up to date on what she was seeing and what she was culling before my trip. So there is a lot of slipwing over half the males. We're showing that where the wings were just kicked out and not closing up good. There was some knock knees, there was some poor fleshing, and then she tried to find who the worst aggressors were to the flock drama to go ahead and pull those out too.

Rip Stalvey: 3:45

That's not always easy to do.

Mandelyn Royal: 3:47

No, sometimes you have to figure out who has blood on their face that's not their own.

Rip Stalvey: 3:52

Now, I'm curious. She started out with 90 chicks. When you got there, how many birds did she have left for y'all to go through?

Mandelyn Royal: 3:59

That was probably about 36. She had them split up into four different pens. The spacing was spot on. The housing was beautiful. The barn that she got put together to put her potential breeding pens in, it's a great setup. She's primed and ready to do the right things. We just need to get the birds doing the right things. She is using a feed recipe from Fertrell, but now we have some nutritional questions about if the mill is actually mixing it correctly. Some of the others were a little bit dumpy, in the picking that she had early from the overcrowding, that's still persisting even with the improved spacing. So either the birds made it a habit or there is something going on with how that recipe is getting mixed up. So we have some more research to do to find out. It's going to be a long term thing to get it all right and sorted.

Rip Stalvey: 4:59

In essence, I think all poultry adventures are a long term thing. It would be nice if I could go out and buy a box of 25 chicks and get 25 keepers out of it. But I know that's not going to happen.

Mandelyn Royal: 5:13

No, that's never ever the case, because those little chicks, they're like lottery tickets.

Rip Stalvey: 5:18

I've never heard it put that way, you're right. I like that.

Mandelyn Royal: 5:20

Well, you can call it lottery tickets, you can call it puzzle pieces, you can call it You know, a whole kit of Legos you got to put together. Some of them have the pieces and parts that you need to move forward. And some of them just need to go in the freezer. I was really hoping to find a good group of 10, like two males, five females, and do two different groups to get her going into the next generation, but. We came out of it with zero males.

John Gunterman: 5:47

Was there much difference in between the three individual cohorts, or did they all grow out fairly similarly? And also, how closely were they spaced together time wise? Was it a month difference? A week difference?

Mandelyn Royal: 6:01

It was like a month or two between shipments to work with her brooder space.

John Gunterman: 6:07

Okay. They all grew out fairly

Mandelyn Royal: 6:10

uniformly. Yeah the top performers, like Cream, they rose to the top, but then after she got through culling everybody else, then those keepers started having problems too. So one of the males who looked pretty promising, and these are birds, some of them I didn't see, they had to get called out before I got up there, but he started getting a snotty nose and she didn't want to go the antibiotic route. So I recommended some oregano oil, but it wasn't going to get there in time. And then he just got worse and worse, so she ended up just calling him out and being done with it. I'm not sure what happened to the other male. I'll have to ask her about that. And then the last male standing, because there was only one male left by the time I got up there, and he had let himself get so hen pecked, and he was growing in his new tail feathers, and he wasn't preening himself, and the hens that were in the pen with him, they were picking him bloody. So she would pull him out, put him in his own space, and then when he would heal up, she'd put him back, and those birds would go and do it again. Yeah. He was not acting like he was going to be a real good flock leader. So she was asking if I had any boys, because now she's coming into, a crisis point because the season is about to kick off and she has no males.

John Gunterman: 7:30

And one that can't possibly be counted

Mandelyn Royal: 7:33

on. Yeah, that freezer isn't going to get filled up without somebody to fertilize the eggs. So I was looking at my boys and taking everything she had said into account to pick a boy to take up there as a last ditch effort, because it would be a line cross and that's not always desirable. But I was thinking she's going to need a real strong flock leader. If those girls are accustomed to getting in there and picking on that boy, they need a boy who's going to stand there and say, don't you touch me like that. So I ended up picking a boy who had risen through the ranks and rooster coop, and he was already familiar with running a flock of 20 males. And he had already been in a pen by himself for two months, which is like a quarantine. And then I added in two training hens from my old lady group and they are, they had already set them straight on their expectations. So between his growth rate, the way he looked, his leadership ability and how he treated those training hens, I figured that was the right guy to go up there. And he waited in the truck this whole time while we were going through all the other birds. To figure out what was going on and what was the best course of action. And I tell you what, when he got in that pen, he was ready to go. And a hen immediately, she went for him. She had her hackles up and she was going to beat him. And he said no, you better just sit down. So she goes off, and another hen came up, gave him the same grieve, a third hen came up, she also gave him grief, and the drama settled with all the females standing around the perimeter of the pen, and he's standing in the middle going, okay, who's next?

John Gunterman: 9:13

Sounds like a scene from an old Bruce Lee movie.

Mandelyn Royal: 9:16

Yeah, he was standing there going, any other questions? And they seem to collectively go no, we're good. He walks over to the feeder and he starts nitpicking over food, going hey, who's ready to eat then?

Rip Stalvey: 9:30

I'm curious, she started with 90 chicks. Now, by the time you got there, you said she's already culled through. How many birds did you actually wind up handling out of those 96 original?

Mandelyn Royal: 9:41

34, 35, somewhere in there. And then the male and one female was at the end because they were coming out of the quarantine coop with their bloody butts because she also had issues with the females getting after the rear ends and the feather picking was still going on. So I feel like there's still potentially some feed issues to figure out. But when we were handeling them, those birds were so long in body. They were torpedo shaped. Think those real big stock hens, and then you get a feel for them and you put your hand down along the keel. And it leaned toward narrow. And I was really hoping to find something just a little bit wider because when you're working with your poultry flocks, consistency is the goal, but if you're not finding what you need, consistency is not always a good thing because then you don't have. Those marginally better different birds to move forward with. And I was really hoping to find strong fleshing. I was really hoping to find some underbody width and some prominence to those parts that are apparent in a shrink bag, which is that underside of the bird we talked so much about. And we found just six females that were meatier in a more meaningful way than the others were, but they still had that same body shape. Of being that long, torpedo like sort of shape. And these were not little birds, like, when you looked at them, like, when her farmhands pulled up with the crate, because what they were doing, it was wonderful how she had set up tables and cages for us to be able to sort into, and to look at them, and to really do this right. Her farmhands were going with UTV to go and collect the birds and bring them up to the barn. Because it was, of course, terrible weather, it was raining, and We had to make do, but these were not little birds when you looked at them in a crate.

Rip Stalvey: 11:47

I'm curious, when you actually got to the handling stage, you talked about a little bit, but what sort of things did your handling of the birds reveal to you?

Mandelyn Royal: 11:58

You mean besides disappointment?

Rip Stalvey: 12:00

Hopefully there was a little bit of positive in there.

John Gunterman: 12:02

I'd like to hear about pin bone spacing and abdominal capacity, heart girth, that, that sort of thing. It was there anything promising there?

Mandelyn Royal: 12:13

Just the six that were fleshier than the others, but they still had that same tightness under there. And then we'll see if we can overcome that. But there were several, like I only found two out of that big pile of birds. There were only two that were actually what I would call underweight as in being a little more skeletal where you could feel all the bones. And then when I'm looking for fleshing, I'm looking at that keel being very different. Difficult to feel, and not having it covered in fat, rather covered in meat.

John Gunterman: 12:51

You want nice, big, plump, servable breasts and not chicken tenders.

Mandelyn Royal: 12:55

Exactly.

Rip Stalvey: 12:57

You talked about the positive things that you found. Were there any commonalities in the poor qualities that you were coming across? Or a common flaw? Yeah, common flaws in the flock.

Mandelyn Royal: 13:10

Just that length without the corresponding width. To me That came off as not proportional because it was all length and then Some other stuff I wasn't trying to look at but I still saw Were little tiny details for the breed standard of that particular breed like the beak color was wrong There was one bird that was completely wrong on foot color and beak color And then looking at the proportions of their angles for the feathers and how the wings were sitting. But I couldn't let that cloud the judgment because it initially became apparent that the first order of business was going to be working on that fleshing and that structure. I wasn't even trying to look at those finer details. I made note, but I knew they were not going to be a first generation fix. That stuff's going to be later.

Rip Stalvey: 14:04

I think too, those finer details you're talking about stand out worse on birds with poor bodies. I think if you can improve the bodies, some of those details are going to correct themselves.

Mandelyn Royal: 14:15

Oh yeah, they can go hide, because something else is so much better. But that wasn't the case there, and then the other thing, throwing them off. The feathers were too long, too fluffy, and it made like this real dumpy look. So they were big and they had some sort of like a semblance of bulk, but they just didn't look clean and tidy. And once I started getting in there and ruffling up the feathers, I was like these feathers are actually pretty long.

Rip Stalvey: 14:44

It can make a difference. It really can, particularly down on the thighs. When you view the birds from the front or from the rear, you see all this kind of wad of feathers over those thighs. And when you start seeing that. Man, you're getting into some long feathers. They should fit rather snugly. Not tight, but not loose either. You want a moderate snugness to those so you can really see the size.

Mandelyn Royal: 15:10

Yeah. Like, whenever a standard says something like prominent, For the thigh, that prominence can come from the outward shape that the feathers are doing, or it can come from the meat. And for that particular variety she's working with, you want it to be meat, not feather.

John Gunterman: 15:27

Yeah. So what other retention goals did you have when you were sorting through her flock? What were, what was in your mind as we're really going to focus on this sort.

Mandelyn Royal: 15:37

Based off of what problems she had and what I'd seen in the pictures, I was just really hoping to find something that could carry us into the next season.

John Gunterman: 15:46

Prioritizing. Yeah. When you have that much of a laundry list and what's your. What was, what would you say the top priority would be for next season to help them dig out of this?

Mandelyn Royal: 15:56

That underbody width and fleshing.

John Gunterman: 15:59

Okay, so we're looking for width in the shoulders, width across the waist area?

Mandelyn Royal: 16:03

No, the shoulder, up top. I feel like maybe what she had to work with had been selected visually.

John Gunterman: 16:11

It wasn't a hands on.

Mandelyn Royal: 16:12

So when you look at them from the top down, it was wide, it was broad. From the top, they looked promising.

John Gunterman: 16:20

And the back was long, flat?

Mandelyn Royal: 16:23

Long, level, good width. It just disappeared once you got to the bottom side.

Rip Stalvey: 16:28

And to me, what you experienced there is a classic case of not handling the birds to see what the bodies were like.

Mandelyn Royal: 16:38

That was the impression I got.

Rip Stalvey: 16:40

Us old judges had an expression, you'll never know unless you handle a bird. Correct. And that applies to selection for breeding as well as it does for show.

John Gunterman: 16:53

We were talking about looking at birds instead of actually handling the birds. So what you described farm hands. Were bringing the birds to you on a gator or some sort of vehicle in catch crates. What? What kind of. What setup did you have to do your evaluation

Mandelyn Royal: 17:09

in? So she had me set up in the main barn, and that way we had space and we had roof covering for the rain that was going on. And the farmhands were bringing them in dog crates, and then I would reach into that dog crate on the back of the UTV and get that bird out and start handling it, and then I would decide what cage it was going into next. And we took a pen by pen approach. So they emptied all of pen one, brought them over. So that very first pen, we were off to a pretty good start. Cause that's where I found three of the keepers. And then I was passing the bird to her main farmhand because that's going to be who's helping her going forward. So it was important to get that. Part of the education to her helpers too, cause it's not going to be just her. And so we would take that bird and I would come up with my assessment and then I would pass that bird to the next person and then onto the next person so that everybody could get a feeling. And then I would talk about what it was that I felt or didn't feel and what could be different, what could be better. And so we didn't go into it with a start with this bird mentality. They for real pulled up and I opened the door and grabbed that first bird because every bird after that is either going to be better or worse. Don't agonize over what bird to start with or where to begin, just grab the first bird. Everybody else after, they're better or worse.

Rip Stalvey: 18:37

I think you were taking advantage of a real teachable moment by doing that and reinforcing in their mind and being able to translate what you found so they could experience it too. That's ultimately what being a really good mentor is all about. I have seen so many cases where people say I got so and so to come over and just make all my decisions for me, or I got a judge to I wish folks would stop depending on other people. To make all the decisions for them. And that's clearly not what you did.

John Gunterman: 19:10

You enabled them to start taking control of their own destiny and their flock. Cause the decisions they, that were made when you were there are going to be far reaching.

Mandelyn Royal: 19:21

And with the level of culling they did before I even got there, they did have to go through for keel issues. There were caved in keels, there were wavy keels. There was a lot of keel problems and so they had specifically asked that I look to see if they had missed anything for those keels and I ended up finding like just two or three females that had just A little dent, but it's enough that you don't want it in there. Cause when you're looking for your breeding stock, you're really looking for your best, most prime examples that are as correct as possible. And they did a great job with the pre culling, I guess you'd say, but I still found. A couple more. And I was able to put my finger right on the little deviation and then pass that bird to them. But we also got into what they had already culled out as just breakfast egg makers. And they were like, we're really curious to see. If you find something to reprieve from this pen, because these were the birds that we decided we already didn't need. So if you find one in here, you're going to teach us something. And I found one. I was like, actually, cause, and it was funny because this particular pullet was the visually smallest of all of them. If you saw her out in the field. You knew she was the littlest, but when I got my hands on her, guess what she had?

John Gunterman: 20:52

She was a little chunker.

Mandelyn Royal: 20:54

Oh, yeah. Super chunky.

John Gunterman: 20:57

Don't get fooled by fluff.

Mandelyn Royal: 20:58

Correct. She was tight feathered. She was in the middle of molting, too, and she was, the coverage of regrowth coming in on her, she looked like a very efficient, made bird. And then when I got the hands on with her, she turned into one of my favorites. And she had the right beak color, if I remember right. Which only two birds have the right beak color out of all of them, and neither one of the two more prominent ones. They didn't make the cut for the table traits. Their coloring was better, but they didn't have anything else to offer, and you can't build a flock around color. No, right. Don't eat color.

John Gunterman: 21:34

And this is a commercial meat operation? Is that their goal?

Mandelyn Royal: 21:38

That's their goal.

John Gunterman: 21:39

They need bag appeal, shrink bag appeal, and they need table appeal.

Mandelyn Royal: 21:43

The shrink bag appeal is the most important thing because she already has a ready made market. She has people waiting for birds to be good enough. Does your state allow for part sales or is it whole bird only? It doesn't specify. We're allowed to do up to 999 table birds without USDA involvement if they're sold directly from the farm. So we can't go and supply a restaurant and we can't take them to a farmer's market, but we can sell them directly off the farm and that's her intention.

John Gunterman: 22:17

See up here, we can't turn a whole bunch of dented keels or crooked keels into thighs and drumstick packages because we have to sell the whole bird intact. That's just part of our state law.

Mandelyn Royal: 22:29

But maybe in the meantime, while getting this stuff figured out, she could sell and part it out and that bone isn't there to distract from meat quality. Right,

John Gunterman: 22:37

I would love to be able to sell barbecue packs. Thighs, legs, wings, drumsticks. cause I, I have a market for breast meat and I have a market for barbecue packs, but I don't have a big market for whole birds. And there's plenty of producers out there that are doing a better job at whole birds than I could, and I can't hit those numbers either. Not on my property size. If I got an acre I can put into production, I'm not going to compete with somebody who's got 40 acres.

Mandelyn Royal: 23:07

Right now, her layout is perfect to get it up and going and operational. We just need the right birds in those pens.

John Gunterman: 23:16

I was looking at some hard numbers this morning myself. I've got one bird who I looked at last year, who was fantastic. I shot a video and I was watching the video again this morning and I'm like, I am getting every egg she lays this year, but I'm calculating if I get five eggs every six days from her, how many potential chicks is that I can hatch out in the next three months? This brings us to the close of another Poultry Keepers podcast. We're very happy you chose to join us. Until next time, we'd appreciate it if you would drop us a note, letting us know your thoughts about our podcast. Please share our podcast with your friends that keep poultry. We hope you'll join us again when we'll be talking poultry from feathers to function.