living near chicken houses

[dmccarty]

farmerspv,

I'll ditto what others have said. My county has a lot of chicken
farms. We looked at numerous parcels near the barns. Most of
the time we could not smell a thing. One operation, which was
near a couple of properties we looked at over the years, I
pulled into one day to turn around. I was withing 10 feet of
the barn and not a smell. And over the years we where near
that one farm I never smelled anything. Maybe we just got
lucky.

Now there are other farms that we could smell when we drive
by at 60 mph. And the farm where a couple hundred feet off
the road. Some of these smelling farms also sit on some of
the pretties land in the county. There are some very nice and
expensive homes near the farms as a result.

I might live near a chicken house but there ain't no way I would
live near a pig growing factory. Them things need to be
outlawed. They built one near my father in law and if they are
spraying waste and the wind is towards his house there just
is no going outside or leaving the windows open. It definately
has decreased his property value....

FYI,
Dan McCarty

 

[farmerpsv]

Thanks Dan and everyone else for the useful info,
this really helps. Cowboydoc, yeah "it is the country", but that doesn't mean it has to stink, no? I've heard that posited before as though to say 'course it smells, it is the country, y'know' /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif. I do think i understand where you're coming from...I'm not a city boy trying to take the country out of the country, nor do I begrudge a person their living. I'm not all that picky, I've lived in the country so I know there are smells there...as I said, i had cows on a previous place. Just trying to determine the degree.
paul

 

[cowboydoc]

but that doesn't mean it has to stink, no?

Well yes at times it does stink. My one neighbor goes through this all the time. His neighbors call the sheriff and the county on him all the time. It doesn't do any good as so far the laws protect him but they have tryed to change them numerous times. A developer came in and built a bunch of fancy houses around his dairy operation. It does smell and he does leave alot of crap on the roads when he's cleaning out his lots, heck I do too. I'm just saying that the country is where farmers make their living. It is going to smell at times, there are gravel roads and they are going to have crap on them at times, and there are going to be cattle bawling, tractors slowing down traffic, and livestock on the roads at times. If all of those things are ok with you then do it. But if you're not willing to put up with those things you might be better off somewhere else. I didn't mean it bad towards you at all. It's just that is what it's like out in farm/ranch country.

 

[farmerpsv]

Cowboydoc,
Yep. that's why I clarified, so easy to misunderstand the written word when we don't have tone or facial expressions to clue us in on what a person is getting at. as an organic farmer, i spray fish emulsion on my crops as well as use manure for fertilizer, but i don't create a constant or overwhelming stink (i think, anyway). i like rural living, i would save the distinction of 'stinky' for the city. but as cited here by some professional chicken farmers, there are some who care more and some who care less (which seems to make all the difference)...and then there's pigs, which are fine also, just not in huge numbers apparently. the long and short of it is, my wife has asthma and i just want to make sure i don't kill her.
paul

 

[40Kchicks]

Paul
Different chicken operations have longer or shorter cycles. Right now I grow about 39-44 days and then have 10-14 days to clean the barns. Some growers take all bedding out, while others take very little. After the birds leave there are places where a crust will form on the bedding material, usually under the water lines, which we call cake. I try to remove as much of this as possible. Many growers have machines that automatically pick up this cake (attachment). Then it is stockpiled undercover and sold or spread during the year. Mortality is buried in compost piles. This works really good in the summer and not so good in the winter which is why I am going to build a better composter this winter. New laws came out this year about manure and mortality management that should help with nutrient run off and uncovered mortality problems.

I don’t know any growers who only have a couple of chickens die a flock. More likely he was talking about per day mortality or not being very honest. The reality is some do die however we try to provide the best possible environment and conditions possible. This is better for the chickens and the better they grow the more income we get.

 

[JerryG]

<font color="blue">you only spread it a couple times a year? do you clean the manure out each time? what do you do with it?</font>

The manure is only cleaned out once a year, but it takes at least a couple of days to get all of the litter out and spread. Also the farmer may or many not use all of his litter, it is customary to sell litter to neighboring farms that don’t have chickens.


<font color="blue">also, what do you do with the dead birds? i talked to a guy with 2 houses and he usually only had a couple of dead birds per cycle,</font>

I compost mine; some like Billy freeze them. There are also some that incinerate them. If he only looses a couple of birds per flock he need to go the work at one of the major poultry Research University.


<font color="blue">those of you who have the chicken houses, do you live on the property? </font>

We have owned this home for about 30 years and there wasn’t enough land nor was the terrain usable for poultry houses. I bought a piece of property about ½ mile from my house to build my houses.

 

[gws]

Its going to depend on how the farms are managed. We had a big multi county egg farm that was run by someone who only cared about the money he could make. Buckeye egg farm was horriable, smell, polution, fly's forced the neighbors into a BIG multiyear legal battle to do something. Finally was shut down by the EPA and is now being auctioned off.

 

[JerryG]

I had guessed that he was talking about broilers? That is also the way large commercial egg (eggs to eat, not for hatching) farms were here in the past, but not any longer. Breeder hen farms are not much different than broiler farms as far as smell etc.

 

[enbloc]

I'll post a voice of dissent. I grew up on a hobby farm. I live in the midst of several dairy farms. A few years ago, someone built a couple of chicken houses behind mom's house across the creek. It REEKS to high heaven. Around here, poultry is what makes rifle ranges possible. Because without the poultry farmers land prices would be so prohibitively expensive that there would be no rifle ranges. (Every range I've ever seen was smack dab in the middle of chicken country, and they too REEK when it gets the least bit moist.)

One gets used to bovine odor - but the ammonia content of chicken is extremely strong. I think our neighbor is not properly disposing of dead birds - the whole woods is rank with rotting flesh odor at times. /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif

 

[JerryG]

<font color="blue"> I think our neighbor is not properly disposing of dead birds - the whole woods is rank with rotting flesh odor at times.</font>
They are not if the smell is that bad. Call their integrator, let them know that you are very unpleased and they will take care of the problem.