Rod and Lisa Grant on their broiler farm at Lochinvar which is also used for trials and proving new products.
Pro Wash Poultry returns to broiler farming
By PETER BEDWELL
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od and Lisa Grant, who run the Pro Wash Poultry washdown, sanitising, product and equipment supply business, have returned to contract broiler farming. Some years ago Rod and Lisa ran a broiler farm near Raymond Terrace but sold it when they decided to expand the company by adding the Product and Equipment Supply division. One of their first products was the Feed Caddy unit for placing feed out for day olds. This was followed by the Priefert Litter Saver for litter
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management. The company also now markets the Italian made Grillo ‘walk behind’ tractor/litter rotavator unit and carry an ever increasing range of products from Brood Paper supplies to PECKStone mineral blocks. In recent years they have added OxyPro Chlorine Dioxide, a water sanitation treatment system and are now launching a new odour control product and delivery system. The idea of being able to develop and demonstrate their products on their own broiler operation appealed and when an older tunnel ventilated farm in a magnificent location near Lochinvar on the Hunter River came up for sale they jumped at it. “Had we known what we were in for we might have had second thoughts,” Lisa said. “Within the first week of owning the property we had a once in a hundred year flood blocking access to the farm and during the first batch everything that could go wrong did, including controllers failing and broken feed augers. “After some very stressful times we got the situation under control, the birds performing well and got on with
developing our new product, PoultryPro Odour Control,” she said. “We had very specific requirements in developing this product. “In the past, many odour management products simply attempt to ‘mask’ the odour rather than dealing with the root causes of chicken shed odour like ammonia and hydrogen sulphide. Poultry Digest visited the three shed farm in April to understand how the PoultryPro Odour Control system functions. Pro Wash Poultry has contracted an Australian based manufacturer of odour control and hygiene products that sell its products and services to a global market. We were there with the directors of the company that formulated the Poultry Pro product for Pro Wash Poultry and some visiting colleagues from Chile who were interested in the product trials being conducted by Rod and Lisa on a working commercial poultry operation. The shed nearest to their boundary and ever encroaching residential housing development, has been fitted with an enclosure about 3.5 metres from the main fan area and fitted with high pressure fogging lines.
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