What’s it like to be a chicken in 2022?

Jun 17, 2022

Chickens are a real science subject. I went to school for almost 10 years studying chickens, and one of the last things my dad said to me was, “I can't believe you went to university that long to learn about chickens.” As populations grow while our land base shrinks, agriculture has a major responsibility in feeding the world. I take that very seriously as a researcher — making chicken production more efficient.

Something else many people don't realize is that a lot of our agriculture and animal health students don’t come from a farming background.

I've been working for the last five years trying to help as many students as possible get experience on farms. So far I've placed about 300 students where they go in and get their hands and feet dirty working on farms for three days.

It's not a visit for agrotourism — it's a hard working job. I plan to expand that program and make it so that all of our students can access work-integrated learning programs; opening the doors so they can realize their potential.

Everybody thinks that broiler chickens grow really, really fast, because we administer hormones and force feed them or we take genes out of bison and put them in chickens to make them grow bigger. None of that is true.

Modern commercial chickens grow bigger because of the role of genetics, nutrition and health management. Everybody's working hard to make them better. The genetics work has been amazing — 30 years ago it took 2.1 units of feed to a unit of gain; now it’s about 1.5. It’s like the way that car manufacturers are working to improve gas mileage.

Click here to see more...

Video: Learning to Wrench From Dad the Hard Way

Harvest is a week out and the farm picked this week to fall apart. The truck needs a battery, the barn curtain's got a problem, and the corn and beans are telling us we're out of time to get it all fixed.

So it's a full day of wrenching. Tork supervises while I get the truck back running, then we're out at the hog barn where one rusted up part has the whole curtain system hung up. Ladder work, cable work, and a little dad-and-son disagreement about the right way to do it. We close it out walking the fields, shelling beans and checking corn, because whether everything's fixed or not, harvest starts when harvest starts.

Chapters: 00:00 Everything breaks the week before harvest 01:00 Tork supervises while I fix the truck 12:30 Out to the barn to find the curtain problem 14:30 One rusty part hung up the whole curtain 20:00 Running the curtain cable from the ladder 24:00 Walking the beans and corn before harvest 26:30 Wrapping up

We're a 6th generation family farm in southeast Iowa showing the real ups and downs of pig farming and row crop farming. No script, just the work. Subscribe and follow along.

JOIN THE BARN TALK NEWSLETTER AND GET LIVE EVENT ACCESS: We're on a mission to hit 10,000 subscribers, and when we do, we're hosting a live event at the barn. Sign up for exclusive access to tickets and details.