Let’s mix our feeds well, and heed to the availed formula. Diluting these formula disorganise the energy and protein levels needed by birds at each stage. It will hinder productiona and you wont get eggs as expected.

To ensure an optimal start for your young broiler chicks, use pre-start, the new intraco pre-starter feed. a 2.5mm complete feed pellet that delivers an excellent balance in vitamin -minerals and in all required vital amino acids.

Pre- start contains 23% crude protein level , high digestability for young broilers from 0-7 days old. Other specific additives included are phytase and xylanase enzymes salinomycine anti coccidiostatic (Sacox) anti-oxydants and anti-mold preservertives.

Intraco Layer 20% Mixing Formula

Week 1 to 6/8 weeks.

Day 1 to 7: Give intraco prestarter.

Week 6/8 to week 17.

Week 17 to 20 week(pre lay)

20weeks to 40/45weeks

40/45 weeks to end of lay.

Mixing Formula For Intraco Broiler 35%

From 0 to 7days
Give intraco pre starter

From day 7 to 14(starter)

Grower (15 to 35 days)

Finisher (35 days till sell)

Ensure change over from one feed to another is gradual

The post Intraco Feeds Formulation: Lets Mix Our Feeds Well appeared first on Sokies Feeds Limited.

Calcium supply should be on target at each level of development
Any deficit will see birds manifest different signs. Like weak legs, weak egg shells and pecking of each others feathers some times.

Therefor a farmer ought b a master mind regulator and monitor of calcium levels in the birds diet.
Ok yes, many formula of feeds have shells, lime, dcp and dcp granula as major calcium sources.

However, at times these a not enough.
An external source whenever there is a deficit can always be sought.

And APSA PHOS CAL has proved to be a very good in water calcium source that can help fight against these deficities.

The post Birds With Calcium Can’t Be Separated appeared first on Sokies Feeds Limited.

Don’t Starve Your Broilers

Those who have been practicing Broiler Farming for some time will agree with me when I say that broilers are “meat-making machines”. That’s what they are. These genetically endowed chickens are hardwired with the trait to grow very fast and reach market weight as early as 5 to 6 weeks. In fact, if you have been doing broiler farming for a while, you can almost notice their size and weight difference in the space of 12 hours. That is, when you leave them in the morning and come back in the evening, you will see that they have grown. Again, that’s what they are – meat-making machines.
To get the best from your broiler chickens and help them to maximize their growth potential, they must not be starved. A study claims that broilers begin to ‘eat up themselves’ (break down body fat) when starved for up to 6 hours. Give your birds as much feed as they can consume. After all, it’s what they convert into meat.

Broilers Say Heat is a Bastard

You may have ways of escaping from the effect of excessive heat, but there is almost nothing broilers can do if you expose them to excess heat. This is why it is important to consider the heat factor when considering the type of housing to use. You must do everything possible to keep them cool at all times. This includes high roof, sufficient shade, cool water and lesser feed during hot days. For the feed, it is better not to feed your broilers if you see them panting during hot days. Giving them feed will only add to the heat stress that is already killing them.

Brood Less in Broiler Farming

If you are planning to brood for four weeks, then you are not planning for broilers. Maybe layers. Because of the mechanical action of eating and the feed metabolism process, broilers generate a lot of heat that makes supplementary heat almost unnecessary. Except in cold regions and on cold days, broilers do not require supplementary heat during a sunny day even in their first week. If you continue to give your broilers supplementary heat, you may start noticing sudden death from the third week. Remember that broilers say heat is a bastard

You Can’t Be Rigid with Your Vaccination Schedule

Although broiler chickens usually come with a vaccination schedule from the hatchery (you will usually get the schedule when you order in large quantities and directly from the hatchery), broiler farming is one of the businesses that requires flexibility, and you cannot afford to be rigid. Broiler vaccination schedule is supposed to serve as a guide for the broiler farmer. It’s intended to show him when to vaccinate and which vaccine he is to use per time. However, it is important to note that vaccinations can be deadly if administered unwisely. 
It is said that you don’t vaccinate sick birds, but some farmers seem to forget this fact. They rush to meet up with their vaccination schedule. For instance, you might want to vaccinate your broilers on day 21. However, if you notice coccidia among the flock on day 20, you must wait. Do not vaccinate the birds until you have treated them for coccidiosis. Keep in mind – Vaccines will only work to your advantage when your chickens are healthy. 

Plan With Your Target Weight 

Some people start broiler farming without a proper plan about the target weight of the birds and the length of time required to attain the weight. Raising broilers for longer than the required time will usually amount to loss on the part of the farmer.
If you are targeting festive periods like Easter and Christmas, don’t start earlier than necessary. To get a weight around 1.8 – 2.3 kg, you should work towards achieving it within 5-6 weeks, depending on your feed formula. Laying your hands on an excellent feed formula will help you to achieve a remarkable weight within a short.
short cut

1. Give an intraco prestarter feed for first 7 days.
2. Give intraco broiler concetrate feed.
3. Supplement well in water.

Also Read

• Running a Successful Backyard Poultry Farm
• Good Management Skills: Essential Tips For Layer Chicken
• Step by step mitigation of gumboro disease.
• How To Clean Your Chicken Coop

The post Five Golden Rules Of Broiler Farming appeared first on Sokies Feeds Limited.

• Feed First Before Egg production

Any successful farmer who keeps laying hens will tell you that layers are selfish. And it will always be feed before egg production – not the other way around. As a matter of fact, laying hens must be fed beyond maintenance ration before they can lay optimally. It would have been easier to measure what a hen will eat all year round if we don’t have different seasons across the world. During hot periods, your hens will not eat as much as they would normally eat during the cold season. This is why it is best to have different feed formula for each season. For instance, because the birds will not eat much during hot periods, their feed is expected to be a little richer than normal. 

• Prevent Diseases for Better and Consistent Egg Production

Disease prevented is better than diseases treated, especially in egg production. This is because sick birds will either not lay at all or have a significant drop in egg production. The consequence of disease treatment is usually bad on the profit of a farmer. That is, disease treatment will increase the production cost, even though the production is lower than usual. Hence, an effort to keep diseases away with routine medication, hygiene, and sound biosecurity measures will benefit you.

• Pilfering is Real in Egg Production

Even in the most secured farms, things still get out of record. Farm attendants and visitors may be able to steal your eggs if you are not extra careful and vigilant. As a matter of fact, any farm where the owner is not physically available will suffer pilfering in varying levels, depending on the number of shady vs trustworthy workers they have. To keep your profit on the high side, beware of pilfering.

• Learn to Prolong Peak Egg Production

I don’t know if you have heard about peak egg production. It is the period when your hens produce the highest quantity of eggs and it can last for a couple of months. Some farmers don’t know this fact. Laying birds at their peak must be treated with highest level of care. You need to pamper them. Show them some love. You must provide everything they ask for; cool water, quality feed, clean environment, quietness, and everything else. Let them feel good, and they will make you smile to the bank. Peak egg production is usually attained in the third month. During this time, you can record as high as 90-95% egg production which makes for a good return on investment (ROI). So, do everything in your capacity to prolong peak egg production and you will be your effort will be rewarded.

• Say No to Credit Sales

Whether you like it or not, people will come to you with the request to take some eggs and pay later. And believe me, you cannot always say no. This is a hard thing for starters who do not have many customers. But let me inform you that egg is a community that is usually lower in circulation than the demand. And you will always have buyers for your eggs soonest. Don’t be intimidated by promises from those who are not ready to pay. You will have to decide whether you are in business or philanthropy. The easy way to handle this problem is to hire someone and put them in charge of sales. This way, buyers will not be dealing directly with you. This is automatically discourage many strange requests. 
Yes, knowing what works best for your farm is good, but when it comes to the top secrets written above, it works on any farm. I hope that this article shows you where you need to tighten up and where you need to loosen up. The target is maximum egg production and you should make it happen on your farm too

• Deworming Poultry – What You Need To Know
• Running a Successful Backyard Poultry Farm
• Local Chicken: Rearing Tips on Success In This Venture

The post Top 5 Secrets of Successful Egg production appeared first on Sokies Feeds Limited.

• Find out the best breed available, BELGIUM BIRDS ARE AVAILABLE
• Prepare your brooding house; heating devices, medications and vaccination schedule promptly
• Get your disinfectant for foot dip and general sanitation ready. VIROCID the MASTER MIND is available.
• Block all crevices and prevent rodents, reptiles and birds from entering.
• Heat up the brooder, well enough be4 birds arrive.
• Reduce supplementary heat every other day until no supplementary heat is needed
• Get a small thermometer to monitor brooding temperature, observational monitoring can be used as well.
• Use good bedding/litter material
• Know your floor space requirement (8 to 10 birds per square metre)
• Keep daily record of your broiler feeding, growth rate, medications and vaccines used
• Monitor weight gain per week (this is your selling point – weight)
• Check your feeding – know when your birds are not eating well
• Feed your broilers ad-libitum (without restrictions)
• Monitor drinking water. Always provide cool water and prevent dehydration
• Broiler chickens need more ventilation as they grow. They will die if denied access
• Watch out for common broiler diseases like coccidiosis and CRD
• Avoid spilling water on the litter. When you do, pack the spot and replace the bedding.
• Use INTRACO BROILER CONCETRATE FEED. IBC35% and IBC5% are well available.
• If possible, start marketing before your birds hit 4 weeks
• Make sure your broiler chickens are free from coccidiosis before you vaccinate them.
• Also Read
• How To Clean Your Chicken Coop
• Predator Proof Ways In Poultry Farming
• Benefits Of Raising Chicken Feeders
• Weighing birds a key monitoring tool in poultry

The post Broiler chicken tips for beginners only appeared first on Sokies Feeds Limited.

1. Vaccinating Sick or Stressed Chickens:

Vaccinating sick birds is like adding to the sickness. When a chicken is sick, the immune system is compromised. At such times, vaccines will only do more harm – instead of preventing the disease. What happens when you vaccinate a sick bird is that, the weakened organism that is introduced into the chicken’s body is now able to cause the disease. Also, stressed chickens have decreased number of lymphocyte. In case you don’t know, lymphocyte is considered as the factory of antibodies. And antibodies play an important role in your chickens’ immune response.

2. Using Vaccines as Drugs:

This is demonstrated in poultry farming when a farmer decides to repeat a vaccine without a proper guide. In most cases, they have the thought that repeating the vaccine will increase the chances of its effectiveness. Some even multiply the doses per vaccination exercise. Well, there are instances where vaccines should be repeated but only at safe intervals. This should be according to manufacturer’s prescription and not just because you think you need to add an extra dose. Some farmers also treat symptoms of viral diseases with vaccines. All these need to be checked.

3. Poor Vaccine Administration:

This involves the management issues that may break a vaccination exercise. For instance, if proper monitoring is not done and some birds don’t have access to the vaccine, this might lead to a serious outbreak in the future. In such cases, un-vaccinated birds pose a challenge to the vaccinated ones and the farmer’s profit.

4. Poor Storage of Vaccines:

Poultry vaccines are usually kept in a cold chain. That is, from the point of manufacture to the point of use, they need to be kept in cold storage. Poor storage will therefore render such vaccines useless, and even if administered, no vaccination has taken place. As a poultry farmer, it is important that you place value on the source of the vaccines used. Only buy vaccines from reputable places that are trusted to have kept all the requirements to keep the vaccines potent.
Poor storage may also be due to freezer breakdown, personnel carelessness or transportation issues. The bad thing about vaccine failure is that it often goes unnoticed. That is, the farmer believes that all the chickens have been vaccinated until symptoms of the disease they were vaccinated for begins to surface. Protect your investment by taking that extra precaution.

5. Use of Poor Quality Water:

As we should already know, water is the diluent used for most vaccines. The use of water with high concentration of salt or chlorine will render vaccines impotent. This implies that you must be sure of the composition of the water used for vaccination. More on vaccination and water quality can be found here.
As important as it is to vaccinate your chickens to prevent them from diseases, it is more important to do it right.
Those who vaccinate in water u can use vaccine protectors on market.

• Benefits Of Raising Chicken Feeders
• How To Clean Your Chicken Coop

conversionfeeds.com
https://www.facebook.com/conversionfeedsuganda/

The post Five vaccine errors that will kill your chicken appeared first on Sokies Feeds Limited.

For Exercise and Leg Strength

What does this have to do with the benefits of raising chicken feeders? I know you may be wondering that local/indigenous chickens are strong and yet they don’t necessarily raise their feeders. That would be a right thing to say but did you also know that these chickens don’t live in confinement. There is little or no room for chickens raised in confinement to engage in healthy exercises. For this reason, putting their feeders on the floor level would add to their laziness. You will agree that if permitted, broiler chickens will prefer to lay on their breast and eat from the floor. If you allow this, your broilers will most likely develop leg problems because of low activity of their legs.

Stimulates Vertical Growth – Height

This is another benefit of raising chicken feeders but I know you want to ask me how. Did you know that stretching is one of the established ways of growing taller? Even in humans. There is that tendency that chickens that stretch a little while feeding will grow taller than the ones that don’t. To make things worse, if a chicken is not standing tall to eat, then it is bending. Such chickens have no reason to grow taller, at least from the environment.

Also, feeding is attached to survival, and if a chicken has to always stand tall to eat, then the brain tells it that if it doesn’t grow taller, there may be no food someday. That’s what I believe.
This however does not mean that you stress your chickens by raising the feeder above the normal level.

Raising Chicken Feeder for Hygiene / Disease prevention

This is almost the simplest and most understood reason for raising chicken feeders. The closer your chicken feeders are to the ground, the more likely the feed will get contaminated. Contamination here is through chicken poop, which might be carrying some infections from a sick chicken and can easily spread to healthy chickens.
Chickens raised in deep litter often play with their bedding/litter material as well. The litter material easily gets into the feeder when place on the floor. If your raise your feeders, you will not find much of the litter material in their feed.

To Reduce Feed Wastage

Talking of the benefits of raising chicken feeders, I think you will not want to joke with this one. This is because it has a direct economic impact on your poultry business. If permitted, your chickens will do all manner of things on their feed – which is also yours.

I often get pissed when I have done my best to get a very expensive feed to the best performance, only to see my chickens scattering everything on the floor like its some cheap food. But not again, I don’t joke with raising my chickens’ feeders anymore.

How To Raise Chicken Feeders

The rule of thumb when raising chicken feeders is to use their present height. You need to the level of their back.

More Important Reads

Layer Farm Management

Deworming Poultry – What You Need To Know

Step by step mitigation of gumboro disease.

The post Benefits Of Raising Chicken Feeders appeared first on Sokies Feeds Limited.

The post Photos: Sokies Feeds Clients visiting our Intraco Suppliers in Belgium appeared first on Sokies Feeds Limited.

Are you a believer in this type of cleanliness? Well, if so, then this is going to be a good read for you. If you have chickens, then you’ll be curious to know how to clean their coop I’m sure. 

Now, if this seems like common sense to you, great! But keeping your birds’ coop clean is of great importance if you want a healthy flock and lots of eggs. 

Here is how you clean your chickens’ coop: 

1. 1. A Clean Place to Roost

Chickens like to roost just like most other chickens. But the thing to remember is that a sleeping chicken is a pooping chicken. 

So it shouldn’t come as a huge surprise to anyone that roosting bars get really nasty. Here is where you can apply a garden hoe. 

Yes, a garden hoe. It works wonders. You are able to scrape everything clean and not have to get nasty in the process. You can do this by simply running the garden hoe over the roosting bars repeatedly until all of the poop knocked loose and off of the roosting bar. 

If necessary, you can spray the roosting bars down with a water hose. Depending upon how nasty they are, oftenly take a sponge soaked in white vinegar and run them over the bars as well. This does help to sanitize and deter bugs. 

2. A Clean Place to Lay

Do you recall how great it feels to get into bed when you’ve put clean sheets on it? It is a lovely feeling. Well, so do your chickens. In fact, if their nesting boxes aren’t clean it can actually deter them from laying. 

So if you want to up your egg production then be sure to clean your hens nesting boxes regularly. When doing this, again, please  make use of the trusty garden hoe. Pull out all of the bedding and scoop it onto the ground. 

The great thing about this is it doesn’t take very long at all. Then, place fresh material back inside their nesting boxes. 

Now, you can use many different materials. Usually well dried hay, straw, mulch or even shredded paper! A lot of people use wood shavings from carpenter hoses and that is fine. A recommendation would be to use what one has on hand. 

After this, you’re ready to move on to the next area of the coop. 

3. A Clean Place to Walk

How gross it is when the inside of your home has a dirty floor? Well, it is kind of the same with your chicken coop. The difference is chickens poop everywhere. Literally! So how you clean their floor will depend upon your method. The commonly used is the deep litter method. This basically adds more material to the coop floor so the waste can compost inside the coop. 

Then a few times a year a farmer can scoop it all out as great compost for the garden. If you use this method, then you’ll need to let all of the waste you’ve scooped from the roosting bars and nesting boxes remain in the floor of the coop. 

Next, you’ll go over the coop floor and level everything out. If there are bare spaces or particularly gross spaces, then add some more litter to the floor of the coop. 

Recommend to use wood chips for this. My chickens love it because they can scratch around, and I’m happy because it makes my coop look and smell fresh. 

However, if you have a concrete floor or any other type of floor in your coop then you’ll need to clean it. So begin by gathering all old material or waste that is on the floor and scoop it out. You can still use the material in your compost bin so you don’t waste anything. 

Then you’ll need to either add more material back to the coop floor, or if you have a concrete (or other washable floor) then you’ll need to hose the floor down. 

Once your floors are clean, you’re ready to move on to the final stages of coop maintenance. 

4. Sprinkle Some Diatomaceous earth. 
5. Diatomaceous earth is a naturally occurring, soft, siliceous sedimentary rock that is easily crumbled into a fine white to off-white powder. The stuff works wonders on a lot of different things. It can be used to keep fleas off of your dog. A lot of people in my area sprinkle it on their yard to kill ticks and other unwanted critters. 

But you can also use it to help keep mites out of your chicken coop and it is totally natural to boot. Which is why sprinkle it in the nesting boxes and on the coop floor. This way when chickens dust themselves, they are putting DE all over them and deterring pests from climbing on them. 

Also, worm the chickens with DE a few times a year. Basically, when you begin to see poop on your eggs a lot, then you know it is time to worm them. 

So a lot of times when I am cleaning out their coop, I will sprinkle DE inside their food as well. Then they eat it and naturally worm themselves. 

As you can tell, sprinkling DE is something that has a ton of benefits, is very natural, and should be included when cleaning out your coop because it helps keep everything and everyone maintained and healthy. 

5. A Clean Buffet

Have I mentioned that chickens poop everywhere? I thought so. 

Well, they do! That is why it’s important to keep their food and water away from nesting bars or nesting boxes because (you guessed it!) they’ll poop right in or on them. 

So our feeder is hanging right in the middle of the coop for this reason so they can’t possibly poop anywhere close to on it. 

Plus, their water system is right next to it. I’m going to share a frugal tip about watering chickens. When we first got chickens we invested in this fancy watering system because we thought it would be the best for them. 

Ummm…no. Chickens actually like to gulp water instead of having to peck to get it out. 

So after realizing this, we tossed the fancy watering system and put a bucket in its place. It is a smaller bucket so the chickens can drink from it, but they are so happy because they can easily stick their head in it and guzzle water. 

Now, if you have a smaller number of chickens you can probably get away with one of the smaller poultry waterers. We have enough chickens that we’d have to have multiple of those and to be honest, I’m frugal and don’t really want to make that investment when a bucket works just as well. 

So whatever you use to feed and water your chickens, you’ll need to clean them. Take them out of the coop and hose them down. That way any dirt can be hosed off and then allow them to air dry. This keeps everything clean and that way nothing gross can begin to grow inside of them. 

And ultimately, it is just one more step to keep everyone healthy which is the ultimate goal. 

Now, I will offer an added tip. When I put the food and water containers back inside the coop and refill them, I will some times add some ACV (Apple Cider Vinegar) and garlic to their water. It supports their immune system.

6. A Clean Place to Run

If your chickens aren’t free range then they most likely have a run or a chicken yard of some sort. My chickens are allowed to free range in our fenced backyard during the fall because they help clean up our garden beds. 

However, the rest of the year they have to be put up because we grow a lot of items in garden beds inside our fenced backyard. This means that they have a fenced off chicken yard so they can still get out and peck in their own area. 

Well, you can’t forget about these areas when cleaning. So you’ll need to use a rake (or hoe) to level out the litter material that covers these spaces. Add some more material if needed as well. 

Basically, you just want to clean up any mess that might be lying around. It isn’t a hard job. It just needs to be maintained so not to become unsanitary. 

Honestly, I don’t have to scoop this area out but a few times a year when I need compost. However, if you don’t practice the deep litter method, then you’ll need to empty it when cleaning for sanitation purposes. 

7. Give Your Chickens A Health Check

When cleaning your chicken, it is also a good time to check on the health of your birds. Illnesses occur in chickens from time to time. Being proactive can be the difference between life and death for your flock. This way if one of them is breathing funny or has any other abnormality, it shouldn’t go for very long without you noticing it. 

As you can tell, this step is pretty easy. It shouldn’t take you very long, but it could be the difference between having a healthy productive flock or a sickly flock. 

8. Mend the Broken Places

Coops need repair every now and then. It is important to keep them well maintained for the safety of your flock. 

So when you are cleaning, pay attention if there are any damaged areas. If so, then fix it. Most repairs to a chicken coop don’t take more than a few minutes (unless it is something major). 

One of the most common repairs I see in our coop is that the chicken wire is becoming loose and beginning to sag. A few whacks with a slap stapler and we are back in business. 

So just keep an eye out for any repairs that need to be made and try to make them as you are cleaning the coop so you don’t forget about them. 

9. How Often To Clean

Well, all of this advice is great and all but how often should you actually do these steps? For me, I clean my birds coop once a week and do in between cleanings every other day. 

The reason is because my birds are super picky. I guess I’ve spoiled them. We have plenty of roosting space but for whatever reason, certain birds want to sleep in nesting boxes. 

And do you remember how I mentioned that a sleeping bird is a pooping bird? Well, you can imagine that my nesting boxes get pretty gross. 

So I clean them out almost daily. Then I do my big over all clean every Monday morning. If I do it on a weekly basis (and move quickly) it doesn’t take more than 15 minutes or so from start to finish. Staying on top of things really saves you time in the long run. 

Well, there are my 9 tips on keeping a clean chicken coop. I hope that you find them helpful and that it will help you to maintain a healthy flock. 

But I’d love to hear your thoughts. How often do you clean your chicken coop? Do you use anything particular to clean it? Do you have any additional steps to maintaining a clean and healthy coop? 

The post How To Clean Your Chicken Coop appeared first on Sokies Feeds Limited.

There are many things that one can do in order to start rearing local chicken and we all have many questions like how do I start, what is needed and will I gain profits from all chicken. The answer is yes and no, if you take care of your chicken in a good way then yes, you will gain and yes you will make loses but the best thing to do is never give up and persist. 

Many people are biased against rearing the local type of chicken because we all have the mentality that they take long to grow and the returns from the local chicken are hard to make but the reality is different from what we know. Once you start rearing them, you will find that they are the easiest to rear since they can easily get themselves food and in the long run you can earn more than what you bargained for. 

And before you start complaining about the local breed, below are some questions that are normally asked and the answers that you need to know before starting to rear the local breed in Uganda: 

This is not an easy fit but in order to start rearing local chicken, you will need to know the following; 

1. How To Collect Eggs 

A farmer will need laying nets if they want to collect the eggs undamaged. You need to collect eggs on a daily basis and to ensure that the embryo grows properly, they should be stored with the broad ends facing upwards and you need a dark, safe and dry place for the laying and hatching of the eggs. When the eggs are laid, mark them with a simple mark showing when they were laid but do not use a marker since the ink might go into the egg spoiling it. The eggs should be kept in an aerated dry place to avoid easy rotting. 

2. The Chicken House

Housing space will be needed and it should be big enough to avoid congestion of the chicken and it should be well ventilated. 

The housing should have perches where the chicken roosts during the night. 

The house should be raised in order to avoid attacks from the predators. 

Brooder baskets for the chicks can be made. 

An example of a perch for chickens to roost 

3. Feedings

Feeding and water containers will be needed before starting the poultry rearing. The chicken need a well balance diet filled extra meals apart from feeds like; greens, maize, left over foods and you will get well fed chicken at the end of the day. The feedings should be fresh and clean without dirt as contaminated food will cause the birds to get sick. 

4. Vaccination To Avoid Random Diseases. 

Chicken mostly falls sick during the first few weeks of after hatching and many farmers end up making a lot of loses due to too much chicken dying. So to avoid all this you need to have vaccines available for the chicken. These vaccines can be got from vet shops or you can hire a vet to come and vaccinate the chicken. 

5. Cleaning The Chicken House 

Coffee husks or wood cuttings will be needed in order to protect the floor of the chicken house protected from the droppings and it makes it easy to clean the house. The husks hold down the droppings till they dry and can be used as manure. 

6. Selection Of Chicken 

Finally you will need only one cock for every tens to provide enough eggs and chicks. You should be one that does looks after the chicks well and does not abandon the eggs during the hatching process. 

So now the feat seems easier with the above tips. However there are still questions that need to be satisfied for the above farming venture to succeed like; 

1. What Is The First Step Towards Rearing? 

 Hatching The Eggs 

When hatching eggs you can use the mother hen or an incubator. Make sure the number of eggs that are being given to the hen are equivalent to the size of the hen and to make sure that the eggs are hatched at the same time, delay the fastest hen for brooding by providing one egg to them as you wait for other hens to also become broody. 

The Egg Selection Process 

You should not choose eggs that are too big, cracked, too pointed, too spherical, oval and small ones. The eggs that should be chosen should comfortable for the hen to sit on for a good hatching. Turn the eggs regularly when in the incubator and you should use eggs that were laid in the past 14 days. 

The Brooding Process 

Brooding is majorly done by the mother hen, charcoal stove, kerosene brooder placed in a container mainly a metallic one. You can use other heat sources like a lantern, foster hen or a heat brooder for the chicken by placing it in a well-ventilated box placed in a wood shaving to provide heat to the chicks. 

1. What Are The Best Conditions For Hatching The Eggs? 

The room that is to be used for hatching should be well ventilated, noise and you should make sure that the eggs are fertilized by the cock and the humidity should be favorable. Check the nest for parasites from time to time and you should make sure that the hens are fed well and have enough to drink and the hens should also be free from diarrhea. 

The Rearing Of Chicken 

Vaccinate the chicks when they make four days to avoid the New castle disease and also allow them to roam around. The chicks should be fed with soft food like crushed cereals or maize husks and water for drinking should be available all the time in clean troughs. 

1. What Are The Qualities Of A Good Hen And Cock? 

A good hen should have straight toes, legs with no scales, a red comb, a not so sharp breast born, clean nostrils and beak and lively. 

A good cock should have straight legs it should be protective and alert in nature, have shiny eyes, larger than a sizeable hen and should have large clean feathers that are around the vent. 

Why Should I Rear Local Breeds? 

The initial investment for the star up of rearing local breed is less compared to other breeds. Whether you need them for either domestic or commercial it’s always cheap. 

The local breed does not need a lot of supervision especially when they are let loose and they can also be fed on cheap local food that is readily available. 

The droppings from the chicken are high in nutrients and they can be used for manure in gardens, used to make food for fish and can also be given to animals as feeds. 

The local chicken has a lot tolerance to the natural hazards like diseases, weather and other conditions and the market for both the meat and the eggs for the local breed are always readily available and people prefer the local breed to the exotic ones. 

The local breed can be reared for both meat and eggs and the beauty is that this can be done in the same place and in small space. Most Ugandans love the local eggs saying they are tastier than the eggs from the exotic hens. 

The eggs need a lot of work so that they don’t spoil easily like keeping them in a dry place, storing them while the pointed part should face upwards, the eggs need to be checked regularly to ensure that the embryo is not spilt and in case they are spoilt, make sure you separate them from the rest so that the rest are not affected. 

To avoid disease attacking the chicken, you should wash the feeders every evening and change the food, use good quality mixed food and you should keep the chicken house clean and dry by avoiding pouring water inside the house. 

There are very many vices among chicken and to control these vices one needs to isolate the birds that have the vice of eating eggs and they should be fed at specific intervals. To avoid infestation, the birds should feed from the hatchery and you should also monitor the chicken so that they do not fight with each other and the egg eating chicken should not be allowed to hatch again. 

The eggs in the incubator need to be checked after seven days to see those that are fertile and those that are not. Those that are not fertilized have red veins and they can easily be seen through the dim light from the incubator and they should be removed with immediate effect. 

And in conclusion the trick to getting exactly what you want from rearing local chicken is to feed them well on a good diet, provide good hydration and keep the chicken house clean. Good luck with rearing your chicken. 

The post Local Chicken: Rearing Tips on Success In This Venture appeared first on Sokies Feeds Limited.