Chicken Broiler units farm

[buffykins192]

Does anyone live near a chicken broiler units farm. I am thinking of buying a house very near one which is due to start up very soon. The farmer says that the chicken poo is going to be spread on the fields around the farm and I need to know how bad that smell is and if you get used to it - please help!

I drive past one regularly, it is really smelly about 75% of the time, a rather horrid mixture of stinky cheese and poo (and I an used to horse manure). I wouldn't risk it.

I camped next to one once (admittedly in Egypt) and the smell was atrocious...

There's one about 1/2 mile from my house. Very occasionally we can smell it here, depending on wind direction, and it makes me want to gag. I walk by it with my dog most days and have to hold my nose at a certain point where the stench is really quite overwhelming.

Friends of mine lived near to a chicken farm, and there were SO MANY FLIES everywhere. All over my friends' house. Summers were awful. The gardens were crawling with flies.

No no no no no! The smell is repulsive. Please don't!

My parents live by one, it reeks.

The thing that you really need to know is how often they spread it. We used to have a farm with up to 12,000 free ranges chickens producing eggs. The design of the sheds meant that the poo stayed under the sheds for the life of the flock (about 14 months) and unless you were in the sheds with the chickens you didn't notice the smell until the sheds were moved and the manure was taken away.

BUT I was in the sheds on a daily basis so used to the smell, plus we didn't spread it on our own fields. If I'm honest, you never really get immune to the smell, and when cleaning sheds down it would get to even DH and me.

Broilers have a much shorter life than egg producing hens, so the sheds are going to be emptied much more frequently, and therefore muck will be spread more often.

Check the prevailing wind direction before making any decisions.

Actually, having thought for a few minutes... the chances are that the house you are looking at is on the market as a result of the planning process for the broiler unit.

They may be trying to get a sale through before it starts up and the smell puts potential buyers off.

Just looked it up, and meat birds can reach slaughter weight at around 8 weeks, so you'd be looking at the muck being spread every 8 to 10 weeks if they operate on an 'all in, all out' basis. If they've got several sheds that they run on more of a phased basis then it could be more frequent.

I drive past a chicken farm of some sort (think it's egg producing) on the way to work and you don't want to be caught in a queue outside, let me tell you! They pile the muck up in a field opposite, presumably to rot down.

I think that even if you are willing to put up with it future potential buyers would run a mile!

Based purely on the smell of the dry, sanitised poultry manure pellets I buy to go on the garden, I wouldn't...

My friend lives near one. No, just no.

God, no. I have kept a small flock of hens and hot curry poo in the sun is vile. Normal poo not too bad, but every tenth shite is a humdinger.

We live half a mile from a chicken farm (free range eggs). We don't have a smell problem but we do have a fly problem.

Gee thanks everyone for all your comments - I'm running away from the house at super speed. It's such a shame because I really liked it but there's always another round the corner (not literally 'cos I'd have the same problem). /emo/te/2.gif

I am sure you have sorted out where you live by now

I would like to add that I am actually on the computer due to the noise of the boilers from a chicken farm near bye. The noise seems to have got worse since last year so much that it seems I will have to move house