To start a poultry farm with a structure already in place and a capacity of 500 chicks, you need a total costs of 10,937.75 dollars. 500 day old chicks costs 1 dollar each.
Majority of the total costs is capital costs which will not be incurred in subsequent productions.
Structures
To make a brooder, you need three pieces of 3 ply @ 6 dollars each. In flooring the brooder for the first two weeks, use 5 Kgs of used carton boxes @0.5 dollars each. Flooring the brooder and main house until culling use 1 canter of wood chips @50 dollars each.
Heating the brooder requires 5 bags of briquettes or charcoal @12 dollars each and 4 brooding jikos @15 dollars each.
Feeds
One chick feeds 45 grams of chick mash per day. For 60 days 500 chicks feeding on 45 grams of chick mash each the total cost is 702 dollars.
500 pullets feeding on 36 bags of growers mash costs a total of 761 dollars. Layer mash is fed to chickens up to menopause which is in week 72 or in day 504. 384 bags fed to 500 chickens costs a total of 8,824 dollars. The costs of 25 tube feeders is 5.6 per feeder and 10 drinkers for 3.5 each.
Vitamins and antibiotics
The total costs of vaccines is 26.7 dollars which includes the newcastle, fowl pox and gumboro.
For vitamins, 5 Kgs of chick start costs 8.05 dollars per Kgs each. Use Alamyein spray of 100ml at a cost of 3.3 dollars each for treating open wounds especially during cannibalism.
For 5 litres of dewormer, the cost is 8 dollars per litre, when using the dewormer dosage dilute 50 ml of the dose with 20 litres of water. For gastro intestinal infection and prevention Alicerlyle of 5kg costs 75 dollars.
