Culling in Poultry: Reasons, Methods & Best Practices

What is culling in poultry?

In poultry farming, culling refers to the identification and removal of birds that are considered to be unfit to give enough profit/benefit to the farm. It is not a one-time operation and it is highly advisable that every farm regularly performs it.

In this article, I am going to share with you why culling is necessary if you want to have a profitable poultry business. Please feel free to do more research about culling to identify more reasons.

Why should you cull your birds?

First of all, as a farm owner, you wouldn't want to waste your feeds on non-productive birds. Feeds are costly and therefore, removing non-productive birds from your flock lowers your cost of production. This improves your return on investments since you have minimized costs.

Secondly, in most cases, culling can be performed to remove sick birds from the flock. This can help to stop the spread of diseases to healthy birds hence preventing loss to your poultry farm.

It helps to bring uniformity to your flock.

As you continue removing unfit birds, you create more space for the healthy birds and this has many benefits on its own as it reduces competition among the birds for the available space/resources.

It will also improve the rate of growth and production of your birds.

When should you cull your flock?

As I have discussed above, culling is not a one-time operation. Every poultry farm should have a regular schedule set aside for culling their birds. This can be every week, month, etc. depending on the size of the flock and the reasons underlying the processes. E.g., Culling sick birds needs to be done frequently to avoid the spread of disease to healthy birds in case of an outbreak (Probably, it should be performed daily).

On the other hand, removing unproductive birds might have a more lenient schedule (Say, once per week).

However, I highly emphasize that the schedule entirely depends on the needs of the farm owner and the underlying reasons for carrying out the operation.

Fact that you have read this far, brace yourself for the different methods that you can use to cull your flock as I am going to discuss them in the next section.

How to cull your flock?

There might be many ways to cull your flock. I am going to discuss the most popular methods used on poultry farms when performing this operation. Here we go;

1. Culling by sight.

Involves culling pullets while being placed in the laying house to eliminate the undersized, underdeveloped, weak, crippled, or diseased birds that have little chance of becoming good laying hens. The amount of space in the laying house has an impact on how many birds are killed.

For each hen from a light breed, allot two and a half to three square feet of floor space, and for each hen from a heavy breed, three to four square feet.

Remove any bird with a permanent deformity that was either caused by an injury or a genetic defect, such as a crossed beak, a slipped wing, blindness in one or both eyes, or any limb abnormality that would prevent the bird from mating or from reaching food, water, or the nesting area.

The most cost-effective course of action is to remove these birds from the flock as soon as you see them. This will stop feeding birds who have little possibility of developing into good laying hens.

2. Culling by Individual Inspection.

After being placed in the laying house, birds in commercial egg-laying operations are often not culled unless they develop an illness or become disabled. Eight to ten weeks after being placed in the laying house, the hens in the small laying flock should be culled.

This gives the birds plenty of time to get used to their new environment and produce at their highest levels. It also gives the pullets which mature more slowly more time to develop. By examining the state of the comb and other characteristics of the head, you may frequently identify non-laying or underproductive birds.

The bird's physical traits will show whether it has the potential to be an excellent layer. Please read more about how to cull by individual inspection here.

Summary

In a nutshell, culling is all about removing unfit birds from your flock. They are many reasons why you should cull your flock such as saving on water and feed costs, preventing the spread of diseases in your birds, creating more room for healthy birds, and bringing uniformity to your flock.

The frequency of the culling operation depends on the reasons underlying the operation and every poultry farm should have a continuous schedule to cull its flock.