300 Chicks Per Year With 10 Hens
Many people would want to venture into poultry farming but have no idea how. Poultry farming, especially chicken farming, isn't difficult to start. You don't even need to start with many chickens.
Most youths leave their fertile lands and other rural areas in search of employment in Africa only to be disappointed by the lack of jobs. Chicken farming can be your salvation from abject poverty because it is the simplest agricultural investment you can venture in.
In this article, I will give information on how you as a farmer can be successful in your chicken project and also multiply your flock of chickens.
How will you do it?
You can start with 10 hens and 2 cocks. You need to programme these hens to hatch chicks at the same time.
- Provide each hen with its nest. Use a plastic basin with grass, wood shavings or old clothes.
- Place one unfertilized egg in each basin or even a boiled egg. This is to trick them so that they can start being broody. Be sure to dust the nest with an insecticide powder to keep out parasites.
- Mark the eggs placed there with a pencil. Be sure to remove eggs that are laid but leave the marked eggs in the nest. The collected eggs should be stored in a cool, dry place, not in the kitchen or cupboard. Be sure to write the date of laying on the eggs with a pencil.
- Normally one bird will start sitting on the marked egg(boiled egg/unfertilized egg) overnight. Leave it for 10 days while it's waiting for others to start incubating or sitting on eggs.
- After 10 days give all hens that would have started sitting on eggs 12 eggs each to incubate. Note: The eggs must have been laid recently.
- Leave the hens which may not have started incubating alone. You can eat the old eggs or sell them. When choosing the eggs for incubation make sure they are not too small, too big, cracked, dirty, too pointed, round or old eggs that are more than 10 days old.
- If this process is duly followed, the birds will all hatch after 21 days or 22 days. Farmers with incubators can also use them to hatch the eggs instead of using hens.
Let's Do the math which is known as the economics of production.
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In this case, 80% of hens can be programmed to lay at the same time. If it is 10 hens, 8 hens can come into brooding at the same time. If the 8 hens are given 12 eggs each then that is 96 eggs. Hatchability can be between 80 to 90%. If 90% of the eggs hatch then we get 77-day-old chicks.
In a year one bird can hatch 3 or 4 times under normal conditions (if it has to raise the chicks) or 7 times if you take away the chicks after hatching.
Therefore with 10 hens and four hatchlings in a year a farmer can get 308 chicks in a year (if the mother hen raised chicks)or 539 chicks per year if the mother hen doesn't raise the chicks.
With this simple illustration above, you can become a successful poultry farmer. Start taking action now.
