Raising broilers
Run a broiler placement from chick-in to harvest - mortality, feed, weights, and closeout.
Last updated 2026-08-16
Raising broilers
A broiler flock is saved as a Lot in PoultryDesk. It is one placement of meat birds in one or more houses, tracked from the day the chicks arrive to the day the last bird is harvested. You can always see how many birds are alive, how much feed they have eaten, their average weight, and your feed conversion ratio (FCR).
Before you start
Make sure your site and poultry houses exist (see Sites and houses), and that you have chicks to place - either hatched from your own hatchery set or received from an outside supplier.
Place the lot
Open Broilers, choose New placement, then:
- Pick the site and house or houses the birds are going into.
- Enter the chick count, the source, the breed, and the placement date.
- If the chicks arrived older than a day (for example after a long transport delay), set the age at placement in days. PoultryDesk uses it to work out the hatch date so the feeding schedule and the flock age line up with the true bird age. Leave it blank for day-old chicks.
- Optionally set the housing system (deep litter, battery cage, free-range, or barn / aviary). It defaults to whatever the chosen house is set to, so you usually just confirm it.
- Submit.
This opens a new broiler flock, labelled as a Lot in the app. Every daily entry is recorded against this flock.
Daily flock records
Open the flock and record what happened during the day. You can record each of these as many times as you need to.
- Mortality - choose Record mortality, enter the count and an optional cause. PoultryDesk keeps a running total and updates the birds-alive figure.
- Feed used - choose Record feed used and enter the quantity. PoultryDesk preselects the feeding-program item when it is available, or the sole eligible Feed item; you can change it before saving. This both records the feed against the lot and draws it down from your inventory balance.
- Feed correction - open the Feed tab, find the day, and choose Correct. Select the contribution, review the before and after quantities, and enter a reason. The correction is saved as a new event; the original remains in the audit history.
- Not fed - on a missing Feed day, choose Not fed and enter the reason. This records an intentional zero so it is not confused with a day that still needs attention.
An explicit Not fed decision also prevents the automatic feeding schedule from generating an estimated Feed record for that Lot and day.
Backfill missed Feed days
Open the Feed round and expand Generate missing records. Pick Feed, choose a range of at most 31 days, and select Preview records. Review the historical bird count, feeding phase, estimated quantity, stock source, cost path, and posting legs. A blocked row explains the missing stock or cost evidence and cannot be confirmed. Confirm generation requires a connection and rechecks the preview before posting. Generated quantities are labelled Estimated; manual Feed entry remains available offline for measured figures.
When you change the Feed round date, PoultryDesk reloads the Lots that were active that day and refreshes their bird counts, phase, suggested quantity, Feed item, existing state, and stock-source status before unlocking the grid. Once a date has loaded, measured Feed entries can still be saved or queued offline. Changing to another date needs a connection so PoultryDesk does not reuse stale Lot or stock context.
- Weights - choose Record weight, enter the sample size and the average weight (or each individual weight and let the form average them).
- Treatments - record medications under the Health module. A treatment may start a withdrawal period that blocks harvest until it clears (see Health and withdrawals).
Harvest
When birds are ready, choose Record harvest on the lot and enter the number of birds, the total live weight, and the destination. You can harvest in stages - record a harvest each time you take birds out.
If the flock has an active medication withdrawal, harvest is blocked until the withdrawal clears. This protects you from selling birds that are still within a withdrawal window.
Close out the lot
Once every bird is harvested or accounted for, choose Close out lot. PoultryDesk checks that the placed count matches harvested plus died (plus any audited shrinkage) and then computes the final numbers for the lot.
What you get
- A flock dashboard showing birds alive, mortality count and percentage, average weight, total feed used, FCR, days on feed, and the predicted harvest window.
- A daily Feed table that distinguishes actual, estimated, not-fed, and missing days. It also shows whether cost is recognized from inventory consumption, was already allocated with a direct expense, or is history-only.
- Feed and medication usage by flock in the inventory ledger.
- A full timeline of every entry for the flock in the audit trail.