Raising free-reign chickens, a good practice in poultry farming

MINERVA BC NEWMAN

CEBU Province—Some 20 farmer associations in Tabuelan town in Cebu are now into raising free-range chickens as good practice in poultry farming based on the experiential findings by the Integrity Circle (IC) of the Department of Agriculture’s (DA-7) Agriculture Dialogue and Information Network Group (ADING) that monitors the free-range chicken module project in the area.

In a community dialog with the IC-ADING team on April 27-28 in Tabuelan, the poultry farmers raised and shared their various challenges, struggles and experiences in raising free-range chickens. Some farmers-beneficiaries of the project have successfully grown and doubled or even tripled the number of chicks they produced from the project, according to the IC team.

According to DA7-IC ADING team that the free-range chicken modules was funded under DA’s “Ahon Lahat Pagkain Sapat Kontra COVID-19” (ALPAS COVID19) for the Bayanihan 1 grants that was distributed to 20 farmer associations in Tabuelan town during the last quarter of 2020.

Under this project, DA-7 distributed 1,200 heads of free-range chicks of dominant CZ breed and 40 bags of feed to the farmers giving each association with 60 heads and 2 bags of feeds for dispersal to their members.

Each association member received 12 heads of chicks and these members shall retain the same number of chicks received for another in-house dispersal to other members in the waiting list.

Project recipient Resca Pugio of the Nagkahiusang Mag-uuma sa Tabunok (NAGMATA) now have more than 50 offspring/chicks from the existing 9 heads (5 female and 4 male) that she received from DA-7 last year.

Pugio said that she very happy to be one of the lucky members of their association to avail of the project.  The chickens, she said have engrossed her family to have more of such breed because of their good body station.

“We observed that the chickens are good egg layers, however they don't brood their eggs resulting to spoilage.  What we did since we have native hens that are laying eggs, we get all the native eggs and replace it with the eggs of the CZ.  We found out that the native hen will brood the eggs until they hatched. I was able to produce more offspring/chicks,” she shared with the IC team in Cebuano.

Pugio’s son added that their brooding nests have three layers composed of straw, sacks and cloth which they usually replace from time to time to avoid the eggs from getting wet that will result in spoilage.

This best practice of the Pugio’s was being replicated by other recipients like Esmeralda Planquero of the Bongon Farmers Association of Tabuelan (BOFAT) and from the Villahermosa Planting Group Farmers Association (VPGFA), who claimed to be successful using the same technique.

Farmers who were not-so-lucky in producing chicks, made the eggs a good source of food.  Evelyn Pable, a project recipient of Canaan Bongon Farmers Association (CBFA) also in Tabuelan said that the eggs gave them additional source of income and source of food especially during the time when they did not have the technique yet on how to brood the eggs.

Lindresa Rubin, another beneficiary shared to the group that they observe that the CZ hen does not brood her eggs, so they were spoiled.  “By The next laying, we got the eggs for home consumption and they are delicious, but we will really multiply these chickens using the technique because they have nice breeds,” she said.

While there are others that have been successful applying the same technique, other recipients still experiencing the challenge of hatching their CZ eggs, but the farmers are very hopeful with the newly-shared best practice.

 According to Quian Ibarra, chief of DA-7 Regional Information Section that the free-range chicken module project was launched in the last quarter of 2020 and now being adopted by two or more local government units (LGUs) in Central Visayas for their dispersal to the various poultry farmers’ associations in Cebu, Bohol, Negros Oriental and Siquijor. (Photos: DA-7/Google Images)