Commercial Coop Capacities

[realsis]

Excuse the mess but hope this helps with ideas

 

[Howard E]

Bump........

Trying to decide to do a companion article on this and post it on the forums or do another member page.

Title will be "Chicken Math", which will cover the various size factors as they relate to housing needs. I still can't get over the "cage free" housing standard of 1.5 sf per bird. By my count, that would enable me to put about 60 to 64 birds in my 8' x 12' Woods house, assuming I triple the amount of roost space, going from 2 to 6. That is absurd. (I currently have 10 and could have up to 20.....at least according to normal historic standards).

 

[aart]

Bump........

Trying to decide to do a companion article on this and post it on the forums or do another member page.

Title will be "Chicken Math", which will cover the various size factors as they relate to housing needs. I still can't get over the "cage free" housing standard of 1.5 sf per bird. By my count, that would enable me to put about 60 to 64 birds in my 8' x 12' Woods house, assuming I triple the amount of roost space, going from 2 to 6. That is absurd. (I currently have 10 and could have up to 20.....at least according to normal historic standards).

Do not try to apply logic to marketing schemes.

Even worse is the 'free range' or 'pastured' chicken product labeling.....
.....means there is a door to the outside(from that 'cage free' 1.5sqft per bird space)and a small 'run'.
But they never go out there.<shrugs> but folks will 'crow' about buying 'free range' eggs/meat.

One of my pet peeves...marketing bs.....am in anti-rant mode tonite tho...or I could write paragraphs on the subject. Wouldn't change anything anyway, except maybe my blood pressure tho.

 

[Chicken girl 15]

I guess I forgot to read the standards. I have 80 birds on 130 feet of roost with roughly 400 Sq ft of floor. Plus they have countless acres to munch on. So what would my flock be considered? Wild?

Oh and I have no fencing for them, they do however have a rottweiler who eats all things dangerous. They also have 7 cats patrolling and a duck who sounds the alarm.

 

[Howard E]

Well the main purpose of the article would be to point out the BS that folks encounter with these small coops (or any for that matter). Actually to go beyond those to a summary of space requirements in general.......starting with how many eggs does a person want and working backwards from there to know how many birds that would take and how much of a house for that many birds and then general parameters within that type of house.

As for commercial flocks, had a friend in the industry call the other day and among other things we talked about cage free and free range houses.......the current commercial versions. She said she has been in the so called "free range" houses that were being used to house upwards of 300,000 birds, most of which never set foot outside. And those are to the standards of various "humane" organizations. Ouch.

 

[Howard E]

I guess I forgot to read the standards. I have 80 birds on 130 feet of roost with roughly 400 Sq ft of floor. Plus they have countless acres to munch on. So what would my flock be considered? Wild?

Oh and I have no fencing for them, they do however have a rottweiler who eats all things dangerous. They also have 7 cats patrolling and a duck who sounds the alarm.

Actually I think your housing does conform to "the standards"......or at least the standards from 100 years ago........the good ones.

 

[aart]

Well the main purpose of the article would be to point out the BS that folks encounter with these small coops (or any for that matter). Actually to go beyond those to a summary of space requirements in general.......starting with how many eggs does a person want and working backwards from there to know how many birds that would take and how much of a house for that many birds and then general parameters within that type of house.

As for commercial flocks, had a friend in the industry call the other day and among other things we talked about cage free and free range houses.......the current commercial versions. She said she has been in the so called "free range" houses that were being used to house upwards of 300,000 birds, most of which never set foot outside. And those are to the standards of various "humane" organizations. Ouch.

I look forward to reading it, and possibly link pasting frequently to respond to the numerous tiny coop problems that pop up here.

 

[Chicken girl 15]

Actually I think your housing does conform to "the standards"......or at least the standards from 100 years ago........the good ones.

That's my goal. To fall back to when life was simple so to speak and families talked not hide behind a screen. Today's standards for just about everything are horrible and inhuman.