Record maintenance is a crucial activity in any businesses especially in poultry farming business or your chicken farm. It will serve as important source for monitoring and evaluation, to analyze the profit or losses made so far on your farm.

A business can be efficiently managed, only if proper recording of data is carried out periodically. So we should take outlets farming as a business.

The poultry farm records maintained are primarily a documentation of accountability and secondarily a data system for management. They should be reliable and relevant. This relevant information, when recorded, should be made available at any time.

Poultry farm records should be simple, easy to understand, without repetition; but must provide all the needed information.

The poultry farm records should be able to clearly state, where and how the enterprise stands.

The history of the record will provide the entrepreneur, a clear picture of all mistakes made in the past and to be avoided in future.

The poultry farm records are necessary to study the production performance, and check whether it meets the prescribed standards.

The poultry farm records should provide information for future planning, changes and expansions, if any.

Note: your records can attract or chase away the tax man. Why would i pay taxes after a reduction in performance or after a disease attack?

In general, poultry farm records can be broadly classified under two categories:

Production / Technical records
Financial records

The nature of the records varies, based on the type and volume of the enterprise.

Irrespective of the type and size of enterprises, the basic records to be maintained especially to act as a guide for poultry farming for beginners and act as an important tool for proper poultry management are as follows:

1. Attendance and daily wages register

● This deals with the number of persons employed daily and wages dispersed to them; including the stamped acquaintance.

2. Building Registers

● This deals with the various farm buildings and other civil works like well, fencing, roads etc.

● In this register one has to maintain the petty repairs and expenditure incurred for their maintenance.

● Moreover, the annual depreciation on buildings should also be worked out every year.

● After deducting the annual depreciation, the actual worth of the buildings should be brought forward for various accounting purposes.

3. Equipment Register

● This includes various farm equipment machineries like feed mill, vehicles, cages, incubators, feeders, drinkers etc.

● The date, source, number and cost of purchase of equipment must be recorded.

● The repairs carried out along with the details of repairs also must be indicated.

● The annual depreciation should be calculated for equipment and the actual post-depreciation value for equipment must be brought forward for the next year.

4. Feed and feed ingredient register

● Feed is the major item of expenditure in poultry production. Hence, much care should be exercised in maintaining this register.

● Few pages must be allotted for each feed ingredient of the feed.

● For each of these items, the opening balance, receipts, issues, storage loss, manufacturing cost and the closing balance has to be maintained.

● In the remarks column, the source of purchase, invoice number and date and cost per unit must be indicated.

● Since the feed ingredient prices vary frequently, the actual ingredient cost for each batch of feed mixed must be taken into account, for accurate calculation.

5. Feed additives and medicines register

Importance of Records Maintenance in the Poultry Farm

● This register keeps track of the various feed additives, medicines, vaccines, disinfectants, chemicals purchased and utilized.

● The opening balance, receipts, issues, closing balance and a remarks column must be maintained for each item.

● In the remarks column, the invoice number, date, cost and source of each purchase have to be indicated.

6. Petty items or miscellaneous purchase/expenditure register

● In this register, all miscellaneous purchases like tools, stationary, bulbs, nails etc. and other day-to-day expenditure has to be recorded and a monthly and annual consolidated report has to be prepared to calculate miscellaneous expenditure.

● In addition to the above mentioned common registers, the following specific registers have to be maintained, depending on the nature of the farm and type of enterprise.

7. Layer farm register

● For each batch, the production performance register has to be maintained from day one to disposal; with the following columns.

● Date, age in days, opening balance of birds, mortality, feed issued, feed/ bird/ day, eggs produced, % Hen-day egg production, Feed/ egg and remarks.

● The remarks column should deal with date of vaccinations, debeaking, medication, post-mortem report if any, sale of culled birds and any other relevant information.

● A separate book has to be maintained for each batch from day one to disposal, so that batch wise economics can be calculated.

8. Egg out turn register

● This is a consolidated record of egg turnover by all batches maintained in the farm at a time.

● This will take into account the eggs produced by all the batches of layers in the farm.

● This register consists of the following columns namely: Date, opening balance of eggs, eggs produced, sold, and closing balance of eggs and remarks.

● Number and sale price of the pullet eggs and broken saleable eggs may also be maintained.

● Moreover, the day-to-day sale price of eggs must be recorded daily.

● The monthly and annual consolidated report, indicating the volume and value of the total eggs turnover may be furnished.

9. Broiler farm records

● For broiler farms, batch wise performance sheet has to be maintained, with the following columns.

● Before the regular columns, the batch number, source of chicks, number of paid and free chicks received, date of hatch, cost per chick and strain, have to be recorded.

● The regular data to be recorded are date, age in days, opening balance of birds, mortality, total feed issued and remarks.

● In the remarks column the medication and vaccination details, cause of death may be indicated.

● These regular columns should continue up to 56 days; but recording should be done until the date of sale.

● Below these regular columns the following particulars like total live body weight of birds sold, number of birds sold, per cent mortality, total feed consumed, feed conversion ratio, cost of feed, sale price of broilers sold, cost of chicks and miscellaneous cost (electricity, labor, medicine, vaccination, fuel etc) have to be recorded.

● Based on the above data, the actual cost of production/ kg live weight and the profit/ loss incurred for that batch has to be calculated.

10. Breeder farm records

● The records will be similar to that of the layer farm. However, one more column, namely the number of hatching eggs produced daily has to be included in the batch wise performance and egg out turn register.

11. Hatchery records

● The hatchery should maintain a register similar to that of egg out turn register but with some modified columns as follows:

Date, opening balance, receipts, settings, discards and sales, chicks produced, chicks sold, chicks discarded, free chicks and remarks.

12. Batch wise hatchery sheet

● This may be maintained, to provide the following information.

● Serial setting number, number of eggs set, type of eggs, strain, source of eggs, number of eggs discarded, number of eggs transferred to hatcher, number of good chicks hatched, number of weak chicks, number of pullet chicks (in case of egg-type only), number of male chicks and mode of disposal, per cent total hatchability and per cent fertility.

13. Chick out turn and disposal register

● This register consists of strain wise chick out turn and disposal particulars, consisting of date, opening balance of chicks, chicks hatched, chicks sold, chicks used for own purpose, chicks discarded, chicks given as free margin, closing balance, price per chick and remarks.

● The remarks column should have the Marek’s disease vaccination and other particulars.

14. Feed mill record

● The feed mill registers will be similar to the general registers discussed above but with more details about individual feed ingredients.

● Instead of maintaining few pages for each ingredient and feed in the same register, a separate register has to be maintained for each ingredient and feed.

● An extra column showing the feed ingredient shortage due to storage, grinding and mixing loss has to be indicated at the expiry of each batch or lot received or mixed.

● More over, the remarks column must indicate the source of purchase, bill number, unit price and mode of payment, in case of feeding ingredient.

In case of different feeds prepared – to whom sold, quality, rate per unit, invoice number and mode of receipt should be indicated.

Note: Multivitamin should be added to water for 5 to 7 days every after vaccination, after deworming, after transportation of the birds, after debeaking, and in case of other stressful factors.

Add Multivitamin also to every treatment to be made for a quicker response in healing, reducing mortality, improving weight gain, performance and improving appetite.