Polyface Farms

Several of us took a field trip to Polyface Farms in Virginia.  They are pretty famous for their sustainable practices of meat production.  It is family owned and run for three generations.  They raise cattle, chickens, pigs, and turkeys.  The farm is in the Shenandoah Valley on about 450 acres.  All but about 125 acres are in forest.  They use a rotation method.  Cattle are all grassfed and moved to new grazing daily.  The egg mobile follows the cattle.  It supports about 450 layers.  They scratch through the cowpies and control parasites and flies.

These two eggmobiles have roosts and laying boxes for about 450 chickens.  They are free range in the day and then they lock them up at night.  The eggmobiles are moved nightly.  They also have some chickens in a permanent building and range.  They are guarded by a dog to keep predators away. 

View inside the eggmobile.

The pigs are kept in the brushy area and they are rotated also.

All animals are controlled with a single wire electric fence powered by a battery which in turn is charges with solar panels.

The cattle are moved daily.  They are trained to come when called and one person can rotate them to new pasture.

Polyfarms buys day old chicks, piglets, and calves from surrounding farms. 

Here they are moving a portable young chicken and turkey pen.  It is moved by hand 12 feet every day.  When they are very young, they raise the turkeys with the chickens.  He says it takes 5 chickens to raise one turkey.  The turkeys have their own area when they are about 5 weeks old.