Stags won’t keep solid bodies

[Anonymous]

Hello I’ve been hitting my head against the wall trying to figure out why my 8-10 mo stags won’t keep solid bodies and even my younger 5-6 mo stags can’t maintain weight … They have been on good feed 21% protein they get acv in they’re water always , wormed … But my pullets are always of nice body a weight. My stags are red faced active dance around , scratching in the sand , up and down off the roost looking and acting amazing … most of the stags are asil so should have great solid bodies , some Pyle’s and Grey’s with the same active attitude but won’t fill out they all have wide powerful backs but that football body won’t fill in.

[Kenny Troiano]

Hey Iregamefowl,

Many things can contribute to weight loss or a thinning of the breast muscles. Let’s look at the obvious causes, such as worms, protein and breed characteristics, which would effect the entire flock, not just the stags. It seems like you are doing everything right there.

But let me address an issue that I have seen many times – and that is “easy access to water.” IF the water is not where they can see it, and easily reach it, or in a place that encourages water intake, many times, if they are not really thirsty, they won’t drink. Lack of water will diminish the quality of their breast muscles. I know this sounds strange and unlikely. I have suggested this many times, and it has, many times change and improved their fowl. I would do it soon though, because once they become cocks, and lack good breast muscles, it rarely comes back.

Now, I’m going to look at the least obvious, and that is the genetic factor. If you notice through the years, or with each generation that the pullets always have good muscle but the stags do not, we could be dealing with a sex-linked factor. I’ve seen this before. Whenever you see a trait that effects only one sex but not the other, it may be a sex-linked factor. We were only able to fix this by infusing another strain into his strain to counteract the effects of sex-linkage. This is a last resort.

I would first put the stags in a pen by them selves, and put the water in the middle of their pen, and feed them close to the water bucket. Do this for a month and see if there is any improvement.

Keep me in the loop, and let me know how that works.

Ps. I just noticed from another forum post you wrote about oats. Just so you know, feeding too much oats can contribute to weight loss. Oats are very high in fiber and can diminish the nutrients in the feed by making the feed go through their system too fast. (Fiber in the feed should never exceed 5% of the total feed content.)

• This reply was modified 4 years, 8 months ago by Kenny Troiano.

[Anonymous]

That makes alot of sense!!! I have my stags in individual round pens and 1/2 gal water bowls up on the roost to keep running pullets from drinking the water just in case of contamination… Also I like the water out side the pen so they can’t dirty the water , I run a small size wire 1×2 inch welded wire and if I cut an access opening for the water racoons reach in and take heads and legs off my birds… I guess the extra work cleaning bowls is better than loosing fowl now that I think about it.. any ideas or tips?

[Sidro]

Coccidiosis can be a cause of thin breast also, do you raise your pullets and stags together?

[Kenny Troiano]

Not so much on a mature birds, Coccidiosis mostly effects young birds. It sounds like something else is going on there.

As far as raising the stags with the pullets. I do raise both together for along as possible.

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