?? Moving a meat bird Tractor ??

[al6517]

I really wanted to build one that is really large and strong like 12'x40' x 3'high made from steel drill pipe and rienforced hog panels for the bottom with 4"x4" openings laced with 2" poultry netting on top of that. Then welding a trailer tongue to it to raise it & move it with a large Deisel motor tractor. Something that will secure the birds while I drive them 200 yds + set em down, then remove the bottoms and place them on top of the tractor while they do their thing. ??????????????????? how's that, what do you think?????.

AL

 

[journey11]

I use a homemade PVC tractor too. Holds like 50 birds. I don't have a big predator problem here, so I don't have to do much other than cover the top with netting (sides are wire). We have hard clay and although I had a dog dig at the side once, he barely made any progress. When I can afford to put electric wire around the outside, that would be a good idea though. Takes me and DH to lift and move it over to the next patch of grass. You have to move it daily with Cornish X or they'll kill your grass in no time flat! Once they're out of the brooder and into the tractor, this works fine for me for the 3-5 weeks they are in there.

 

[jaku]

Quote:
Make it light. My wooden one was hard to move, but the PVC one I have now is great. The only real problem is that sometimes they are lazy and don't want to follow it.

 

[hcammack]

on the farm I worked on we used 8x8 tractors with metal roofing I wouldn't suggest this for anyone who doesn't think they can drag 200+ lbs every day. We used a dolly to move them by putting it under the back even with that on wet days the coops were almost impossible to move another problem with moving it is if you aren't carefull you can crush the slow moving meaties. We usually did it in a team of two one in the back makeing sure none of the birds were crushed and one in the front rolling the coop.

Henry