Risks of raising layers near meat birds

[AgroUrica]

For several months now I've been raising Cornish X's and also buying adult birds when the need arises. In all, I'm selling live/processing about 600 birds a month for my clients.

My setup for producing/processing the birds is sort of a U-shaped pen arrangement in the backyard. Once birds leave the brooder, they go into one large, roofed pen on one side of the yard. That pen is sectioned off with moveable barriers. As they need more room, I enlarge the sections. They finally swing around to the other side of the yard and once reaching the final section of that roofed pen, they're ready for processing.

Here's my question.

In that middle section of yard that's not currently used for birds, I've been thinking about setting up layers. How risky is it to have my layers surrounded by a "converyer belt" of meat birds?

 

[Den in Penn]

I don't see any more risk then having two coops of layers next to each other.

 

[sarahswank]

You do run some risk. If I understand your meat bird set up, you bring in a large batch of chicks and raise them until slaughter, and then start over fresh (adding in a few adult birds along the way though.)

as in you don't already have a breeding set of birds that are producing your cornishX? correct? Basicly all-in/all-out(If that isn't correct then the risks below are not really as relevant.)

if so, you risk your perminate layer flock being exposed to more serious like Merck's. (although with chicks coming in that is less likely with proper vaccinations of all chickens)

You also put your meat business at risk, You are going to be keeping chickens around, meaning your going to now have potentially harmful microbes already in your flock that could be passed on to chicks and potentially increase your death rates and affecting your bottom line.

Now, I am not saying that those risks are terribly high, nor am i saying it is a bad idea to keep a laying flock near, but not touching your other chickens. Your going to have to judge for yourself if those risks are worth keeping a layer flock vs. the benefits you will get.

 

[donrae]

If your meaties are healthy and from a trusted source, I don't see the problem. I've raised meaties and layers together, on a much smaller scale!, and done just fine.

 

[AgroUrica]

You do run some risk. If I understand your meat bird set up, you bring in a large batch of chicks and raise them until slaughter, and then start over fresh (adding in a few adult birds along the way though.)

as in you don't already have a breeding set of birds that are producing your cornishX? correct? Basicly all-in/all-out(If that isn't correct then the risks below are not really as relevant.)

if so, you risk your perminate layer flock being exposed to more serious like Merck's. (although with chicks coming in that is less likely with proper vaccinations of all chickens)

You also put your meat business at risk, You are going to be keeping chickens around, meaning your going to now have potentially harmful microbes already in your flock that could be passed on to chicks and potentially increase your death rates and affecting your bottom line.

Now, I am not saying that those risks are terribly high, nor am i saying it is a bad idea to keep a laying flock near, but not touching your other chickens. Your going to have to judge for yourself if those risks are worth keeping a layer flock vs. the benefits you will get.

Thanks for the comments everyone.

I'm not breeding my own Cornish X's as that's a pretty expensive proposition....grandparents, parents and then crossing lines to get a hybrid. No, I'm buying chicks that are a few days old (already vaccinated)....200 to 300 at a time and raising them for 40 days or so until slaughter. When there are "holes" in my production, I buy adult birds which are kept for a week or so before slaughter.

I think I'm going to give it a try but not before I can get my setup better situated.