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Poultry House Best Management Practices

1. Poultry house after birds removal. The poultry litter is a mixture of poultry manure and some type of inert material in this case wood shavings. At the end of the poultry production cycle, around 6 weeks, the litter have received the poultry manure from birds and in the surface some feathers.

2. The poultry litter is removed mechanically. Normally 1 inch of poultry manure is removed each two cycles of poultry production. A complete recycle of the poultry litter is less frequent could be each 4 or 5 years.

3. Detail of the poultry litter removal. The removal depth is controlled from the tractor.

4. The capacity of this machine is approximately 4,000 pounds of poultry litter.


5. Detail of the transport band that transfer the poultry litter from the ground to the


6. Poultry house after the removal of the poultry litter. The poultry litter removed from one strip is approximately the full capacity of the machine.

7. The same machine spread the poultry litter over the field surface.

8. The application of 1,000 kg of poultry litter can contribute with 38 kg of N but also could be an important source of other nutrients like phosphorus, potassium and magnesium and some micro-nutrients.

9. Detail of the poultry litter field application. Notice that the size of the poultry litter peaces is not homogeneous and vary from big cluster to small dust particles.

10. Grazing pastures is another important component of the system. The pasture should be able to retain much of the nitrate produced during the decomposition of the poultry litter.

11. Animals feeding from the pasture are also recycling nutrients and retaining some in their bodies and depositing excreta less harmful than the poultry manure.

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