Poultry School
Thursday, July 9, 2009 
10:00 – 3:00 pm
Location: the Tufts Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine, 200 Westboro Road, North Grafton, MA 01536. We will meet in the poultry barn.
Cost: $35 registration fee includes lunch and resource materials.
In this poultry field school, you will learn the basics of raising poultry for eggs and meat. The training will be divided into both classroom and practical skills components.
The morning classroom training will cover information on:
- biosecurity practices for your flock,
- poultry health and disease management,
- breeds and breeding systems,
- feeding and nutrition,
- processing eggs and meat (regulatory requirements),
- enterprise budgets and recordkeeping, and
- marketing both meat and eggs.
The afternoon practical skills training will cover:
- assessing poultry for health and productivity
- preventive treatments and vaccinations
- candling eggs for market sales
- types of equipment and supplies helpful for pastured poultry production
- fencing demo and overview of pasture rotation considerations
- introduction to the Mobile Poultry Processing Unit
- other practical skills.
To participate in the training, please complete the registration form (pdf) and return to the New Entry Lowell office by mail, fax, or email to: nesfp@tufts.edu
A Few Poultry Resources:
ATTRA’s Livestock Resources website has many great articles on sustainable poultry production for meat and eggs. Their Range Poultry Toolbox is especially useful.
The FeatherSite has many different poultry resources, including a photo gallery of all types of poultry breeds for egg and meat production.
NCAT (National Center for Appropriate Technology) also has a Sustainable Poultry Website which has an array of helpful resources for poultry producers.
Pete and Jen’s Backyard Birds also has a helpful Small-Scale Poultry Resource list (pdf) including links to equipment suppliers, websites, and other information relative to Massachusetts producers.
For poultry electronet fencing supplies, visit Premier 1 Fence Company.