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Our proven and established process, from egg to chick.

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Pre-Setting

 

Our eggs are sourced from a number of farms and countries, all of which are visited annually by our team. Furthermore, our Vet reviews blood tests and the hens before the season begins and continues to monitor throughout to ensure optimum laying efficiency and quality.

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Day 0

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Eggs are trayed in their particular breeds and farms and are labelled to reflect this. We strongly believe that traceability is key and have set up systems so that we can follow our egg to peg process. Prior to setting the eggs, we increase the temperature of the egg and fumigate to allow a more consistent temperature when setting, also reducing any disease that may be held on the shell. 

 

Eggs are placed in our incubators for 21 days on pheasant and 20 days on partridge - the machines are monitored regularly and automatically rotate the eggs allowing the embryo to develop evenly, akin to the hen rolling the egg whilst in the nest. 

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Day 21

 

After the incubation period, our eggs are transferred through our automatic candling and transferring machines, allowing us to remove any infertile eggs or dead-in-shell embryos, further ensuring disease is kept at bay during the hatch. The automated machine also provides us with the necessary figures on fertility, so that we can plan the hatching schedule in the forthcoming days. Once the eggs are transferred, they are placed in our hatchers, which have a 10 stage process where the embryo will transition through over the next 4-5 days. Our hatchery is managed 24/7 throughout the season, along with having an automatic alarm system linked to each machine to let us know if it has moved out of its critical control points.

 

Day 25 

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After 25 days within our hatchery the egg is now a chick, ready to be delivered to its new home! We run an automatic breuil chick counting machine, which allows us to quality check at several points, and place the chicks in their 'one use' insulated cardboard boxes quickly and efficiently. 

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Our chicks are then finally transported overnight by our loyal drivers across the UK and Ireland in temperature controlled vans. Each van is set up to provide a consistent temperature and airflow throughout the journey to reduce any stress on the chick and a probe is taken from each van after every delivery for us to analyse the temperature within the van whilst on its journey.

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Next Step in Our Process

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Chick to Poult in our patented Rearing Systems