General tips for small scale poultry production

From Poultry Hub

The following tips on aspects of small scale or backyard poultry should only be used as a guide. Poultry Hub accepts no responsibility for persons who use this information to grow or prepare poultry and poultry related products. Add tips yourself using the editor or email them to admin@poultryhub.org

Contents 1 Catch, check and dispose of spent birds 1.1 Catch and hold a bird 1.2 Check health and laying condition 1.3 Humanely kill a bird 1.4 Dispose of the carcase 2 Egg cleaning and salmonella 2.1 Key points for good egg washing 2.2 Overheating eggs 3 Identify stock 3.1 To identify and draft poultry 4 See also 5 External links

Catch, check and dispose of spent birds

From: Poultry Agskills – A Practical Guide to Farm Skills

Culling is removal of individual birds from the flock and in most cases, humanely killing them. Culling is an essential management practice. It is part of maintaining the health of the flock and high egg production. Sick or diseased birds that can’t be treated should be killed as part of preserving the health of the rest of the flock. It is also pointless keeping non-laying bird unless it is a pet. If the bird is not sick, but still needs to be culled, it can be used for food consumption. Modern hybrid layers are not really suitable as table birds as they are light and small framed, with little meat on their bones. Other breeds are more suited for the table. If you want to preserve high egg production of your flock, you will choose to cull all birds that have completed two complete laying cycles in an all-in all-out system. In a culling operation, you should act in a quiet, deliberate, confident and humane manner.

Catch and hold a bird

The following points are useful in catching and holding birds:

• Quiet birds are the easiest to catch.
• Pen the bird in a confined space first.
• Birds are quiet and easy to manage in low light conditions (eg dusk).
• A catching hook may be used to hook the animal’s leg.
• Approach the bird quietly and make slow deliberate movements that block escape.
• Grasp the wings to the body by moving your hands down over the top of the bird.
• Then grasp the legs in one hand while continuing to hold a wing to the body with the other.
• Support the bird’s body with the hand holding the legs and when it has settled, the bird should be easy to inspect as required.

Correct method of catching and carrying poultry (Click on images for larger version)

Holding a hen in a comfortable position

Checking a hen for laying status by measuring the spread of the pubic bones

Checking a hen for laying status by examining the colour and condition of the vent

Check health and laying condition

While holding the bird securely, check its general health and condition and its laying status:

1. A good layer will have a large, smooth, moist, pinky-white vent.
2. The two small bones at the sides of the vent are called the pubic bones.
3. They should be flexible and wide apart, with at least two finger widths between them (one finger width = 2cm).
4. The abdomen should be deep, soft, and pliable without an accumulation of body fat.
5. The depth of the abdomen is measured between the tip of the keel or breast bone and the pubic bones.
6. Laying hens should have a depth of three or four finger widths (6 to 8 cm).
7. The non-layer will usually have a smaller body with a shallow, firm abdomen.
8. Pullets and non- laying hens have a depth of about two finger widths (4cm) between the pubic bones and keel.
9. The pubic bones are usually stiff and close together when the hen is not laying the distance between the pubic bones is one finger width or less.
10. The vent of a non-layer is usually small, puckered, and round.

Humanely kill a bird

• If right handed, grasp the bird’s shanks in the left hand with the breast of the bird facing away from you.
• Hold the bird’s head in the right hand, placing your thumb over the bird’s head at the point where the neck joins the head. Wrap your four fingers around the throat area of the lower head, with the little finger against the bird’s bottom beak.
• With the bird’s breast resting across your right thigh, twist the beak upwards with the fingers, while holding the back of the head down with the V formed between the thumb and index finger. The bird’s head should now be at right angles to the neck.
• While holding the head in this angled position, quickly and forcefully pull the head downwards in a short, sharp movement, all the while holding the legs firmly in the other hand.
• This extension will dislocate the bird’s neck immediately behind the skull.
• When performed correctly, you will feel the dislocation of the neck and it will create a cavity between the head and neck. This severs the spinal cord and jugular vein instantaneously. Killing is quick, clean and humane.
• Continue the slight downward pressure until there is a 1–2 cm gap between the head and the top of the broken neck.
• If the head is kept hanging down the blood will drain into this cavity.
• Do not pull the head too far or it will be severed from the body.
• Wing flapping will normally occur. This is simply a muscular reaction, although the bird is dead. The flapping should stop within approximately 30 seconds.

Let birds quieten down before killing (Click on images for larger version)

Place the thumb over the bird’s neck and wrap four fingers around the throat

Hold the head horizontally in the V formed between the thumb and index finger

Quickly and forcefully pull the head downward while holding the legs firmly

(NB: No animals were killed or injured in producing this information)

Dispose of the carcase

1. Birds that are sick before being killed should not be eaten.
2. Dispose of these carcases by immediate burial, burning or by taking to a vet.
3. If burying a carcase, ensure it is buried deep enough to prevent retrieval by dogs or foxes.
4. If burning the carcase, use a closed incinerator to reduce the airborne spread of disease.

Egg cleaning and salmonella

In the Australian context, it is generally accepted that we do NOT have the types of Salmonella that can transmit from the hen to the egg. This type of Salmonella does exist elsewhere in the world – Therefore people should be very careful about where they order sunny side up eggs or have real egg mayonnaise.

Faecal contamination on eggs is a source of Salmonella and this concern is amplified with cracked eggs and even worse, cracked and dirty eggs. Therefore, people should have concerns about egg washing. If washing is not done correctly (e.g. if the washing is done at the wrong temperature), there is a possibility of the natural barriers of the egg being compromised. Hence, poor quality washing can actually be more of a risk, causing the outside bacteria to be sucked inwards into the egg. Good, well managed egg washing is beneficial, conversly poorly done washing is more likely to cause a problem than solve the problem. Finally, Salmonella is a very good survivor in the environment, hence any compromise of the natural barriers of the egg can provide an opportunity for Salmonella. Therefore one should seek fresh eggs with no obvious shell damage and prefer washing to be done in a professional and controlled manner. If in doubt, simply go for the well cooked egg (hard boiled eggs)!

Key points for good egg washing

Very dirty eggs should first be dry scraped to remove the bulk of the material. Use warm detergent solution (43-52^oC) - important that this temperature is always higher than the egg temperature (around 15^oC higher but not greater than 50^oC) and change wash solution if clearly dirty.

Overheating eggs

As a home consumer, it would be unlikely that you are going to temperature abuse (overheat) your backyard eggs or store them for a prolonged period. It is this temperature abuse and prolonged storage, when combined with subsequent inappropriate food handling that results in food-borne disease. In Australia, the types of Salmonella present in our food production animals have a large infectious dose. You really need to consume large numbers or the organism to acquire the disease (this is why temperature abuse is such a critical factor in food-borne disease outbreaks - the Salmonella needs time and right conditions to multiply). Poor egg washing can result in a compromise of the natural egg barriers and entry of faecal Salmonella into the egg. In conclusion, given that there is no temperature abuse or prolonged storage, and good kitchen hygiene, it is unlikely that poor egg washing will have an impact on you.

Identify stock

From: Poultry Agskills – A Practical Guide to Farm Skills (NSW DPI, ISBN 978-0 7313 0616-9)

There are two main ways of identifying poultry. The first is to identify the physical differences between the sexes, which is particularly important in culling and separating female layers from the males. Males may be selected for further breeding or culled. Identifying individuals can be done in a number of ways. Birds may be wing-tagged or have a numbered or coloured legband attached. Birds used in a breeding program are often identified by toe punching, in which a hole is made in the web of the feet in one of 16 different combinations. If an individual needs to be separated from the flock for mating, breeding, medicating, quarantining or to break broodiness, they can be caught, identified and housed separately.

Examples of identification leg bands for poultry (Click on images for larger version)

A toe (web) punch is used to identify chickens in a breeding program for exhibition birds

The feathers of the female are well developed

The wing feathers of male day-old chicks are smaller

To identify and draft poultry

When you purchase day-old chicks from a commercial hatchery, they have been expertly identified either by vent-sexing, or by wingfeather examination. The wing feathers of a female chick are thick and well-developed, while the male has smaller, thinner wing feathers. In some cross-breeds, the day-old progeny can be sexed by colour. There is a genetic link between colour and sex. For example, in across between a Rhode Island Red male and a White Wyandotte female the male day-old chicks are white and the females are reddish. It is difficult for a backyard breeder to identify the sex of birds until they are four to five weeks of age or even older. Males are faster growing and by six weeks of age have bolder heads, longer necks and show reddened wattles and comb. Feathers on the back (the saddle) of females are blunt, dense and wide. Feathers on the back (the saddle) of the male are pointed, less dense and distinctly tapered.

See also

• A Simple Guide to Managing Village Poultry in South Africa
• Alternative poultry production systems
• Building the Poultry Penthouse (book)
• Disease prevention and biosecurity
• Family Poultry Training Course
• Poultry Agskills (book)
• Sustainable Village Chicken Keeping for Pacific Island Communities

External links

• International Poultry Breeders Association is an online resource developed by the International Poultry Breeders Association, which was established to give poultry breeders of all breeds of feathered fowl a way of organising and maintaining a record of ancestral breeding.