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For thousands of years the
gamefowl breeds have been kept and bred for competitive fighting
purpose as well as producers of meat and eggs. With the recent
trend in many of the worlds leading economic countries to ban the
sport of "cock fighting" these breeds that have been a part of the
poultry world for many centuries now face possible extinction.
While some third world countries still allow this sport there is
ever increasing economic and social pressure on them as well to ban
it. We at Porterfield Exotics in no way condone cock fighting,
now illegal in all 50 states of the U.S.A.. We do however
believe these beautiful and impressively muscled and agile athletes
of the poultry world that have been carefully developed over many
centuries should not be allowed to just fade from existence.
With our final U.S. state of LA banning this sport just this year we
have decided to acquire some breeders off some of the more popular
game fowl lines and continue to propagate them for the purpose of
meat, eggs, ornamental properties, and show. If all goes well
we hope to establish small breeding groups of 5 or 6 different
breeds and various bloodlines and plumages of these magnificent
birds.
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One may
say; what do you want to preserve fighting chickens for if fighting is a
banned sport. Well, for starters they are attractive fascinating birds
to keep and observe. But, this is not the only reason to preserve
them. For example; the Cornish Rock Cross chicken which is the
cornerstone to modern poultry production is in fact a hybrid developed off
of the Asian and English fighting game fowl. The Cornish Rock has
changed the commercial chicken meat production industry in a big way.
They can be raised in a factory farm method with very little space and
unbelievable feed to meat conversion from chick to butcher weight in just 8
weeks. They have made it possible to mass produce enormous meaty
chickens at a very low cost. I personally would rather have a good old
fashioned slow grown free range chicken myself but if all chickens were
raised in the old traditional methods many people would not be able to
afford chicken. My purpose for stating this is not to advertise or
promote the Cornish Rock but to point out that the genetics coming from
these fighting birds were the building blocks of our modern poultry
industry. If we were able to develop these Cornish Rocks off these
breeds who knows what potential they may hold in their genetics for future
uses.
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