Backyard broiler cooperative

[osbmail]

From some friends who live down the road.

 

[LeeBrad]

If you were going to do it anyways, why not raise them all yourself and charge others when they are processed? You should be able to make $12-$13 net per bird. You said yourself, there is not much difference in raising more birds. You could even have folks come and help on processing day to pick them up, so it's not as big of an inconvenience for you. People's schedules can be difficult to deal with and that could get tough when you get close to processing day.. Most folks would rather have someone else do it and just pay them.

 

[osbmail]

In area chickens are not bring as high of price 12or13 dollar net is on the high end of what people are getting I get about 6or7 dollar profit .40 is about all I can get in my chicken tractor so don't want more right now . So far I have 3 people interested and we will be get a total 160 chicks I might keep this post going with how the project works out.

 

[osbmail]

Got 160 chicks order they will be here at the beginning of August . I am excited to get the project going Hopefully it will make raising meat birds easier for small backyard operations.

 

[Hummingbird Hollow]

Got 160 chicks order they will be here at the beginning of August . I am excited to get the project going Hopefully it will make raising meat birds easier for small backyard operations.

How many are you planning on keeping for yourself?

 

[osbmail]

Only keeping 40 for myself.

 

[dealfinder500]

Where'd you get your chicks? Ideal Poultry has been having weekly specials for a while now. Nearly every week they've had Cornish Rocks for $1.15. This week it is Black Broilers for $1.15.

Have you processed them before? I have not, and I am probably going to be taking them somewhere to have them processed. But from what others have said, when they first started it took them a half day or more to do just a handful of birds. You might want to take that into consideration, before you have everyone show up with 150+ birds and you only end up getting through 50 or even just 25 of them in one day... might lead to bad feelings all around.

That's a good idea though, going in for an order and the also going in for processing. I'd be curious to know how much it ended up costing you per bird in the end.

 

[osbmail]

Yeah I done them before it took me and 2 guys 4 hours to do 40 . So with extra help and more killing cones I don't see why we could not do 200 so 160 should be very do able . I will also have more experience I think we did 10 in the first 2 hours and 30 the next 2.The major slow down was only one killing cone . I think the major saving will be in chicks and processing . I am ordering chicks from moyer in PA.

 

[ChaoSS]

Most of the slow down for us new guys is hand plucking. You said you are renting a plucker so that's not an issue.

 

[dealfinder500]

Yeah I done them before it took me and 2 guys 4 hours to do 40 . So with extra help and more killing cones I don't see why we could not do 200 so 160 should be very do able . I will also have more experience I think we did 10 in the first 2 hours and 30 the next 2.The major slow down was only one killing cone . I think the major saving will be in chicks and processing . I am ordering chicks from moyer in PA.

That's not bad. I think a lot of it is the experience - once you figure out a system it would probably go quickly.

I've ordered pullets from Moyer - was very pleased. I'd love to know how their meat birds turn out.