an enterprise that produces poultry products on a commercial basis. Poultry farms are usually located near large cities and industrial centers in order to supply the population with fresh eggs and meat. The first such farms in the USSR—the Brattsevo, Glebovo, and Tomilino farms in Moscow Oblast—were established between 1930 and 1932. There were nine poultry farms in 1950,20 in 1957, and 608 in 1975.

Poultry farms specializing in egg production have 100,000 to 1 million laying hens, which yield 20 to 250 million eggs annually. Meat poultry farms raise 1 to 4 million chickens a year, 250,000 to 500,000 turkeys or 500,000 to 1 million ducks. The technological process is organized on a commercial basis. The farms have special facilities for maintaining the parent flock, incubating the eggs, raising the young, maintaining the commercial hen or meat chick flocks, killing and dressing the poultry, sorting and packing the eggs, and processing poultry by-products. Each operation is organized in such a way as to ensure the continuous flow of the technological process.

Some poultry farms are organized to specialize in certain operations—for example, the production of hybrid chicks, the raising of replacement hens, or the production of eggs and meat. Production is based on the use of highly productive hybrid poultry and nutritionally balanced feed rations, the regulation of rearing conditions, the mechanization and automation of production processes, the scientific organization of labor, and the coordination of work in all the sections of the farm. Layers are most effectively kept in wide poultry houses in deep litter and in cage batteries. Broilers are slaughtered at 56 to 65 days of age, at a weight of 1,300–1,500 g, turkey poults at four months at a weight of 4–4.5 kg, and ducklings at two months at a weight of 2–2.5 kg.

Brooders and poultry houses for layers have cage batteries and are equipped with automatic waterers and mechanized food dispensers. The droppings are removed and the eggs are gathered mechanically. Wide poultry houses have mechanical food dispensers, automatic waterers, and egg-laying nests. Hatcheries are equipped with incubators that provide optimum conditions of incubation. Egg storehouses have machines for sorting, cleaning, and packing the eggs, and killing rooms have conveyor lines for processing the poultry. Feed-preparation shops are equipped with machines for preparing the rations. Measures to guarantee sanitary feeding conditions, rearing conditions, and production processes have been introduced at poultry farms.

On the Borovskii Poultry Farm in Tiumen’ Oblast gross egg production in 1974 totaled 247.5 million eggs. Each chicken laid 256 eggs, with a feed consumption of 1.66 kg per ten eggs; labor expenditure for the production of 1,000 eggs was 2.14 man-hours. In 1974 the Vilnius Broiler Farm in the Lithuanian SSR raised 2,110,000 chicks, which at 68 days of age weighed an average of 1,889 g. Feed consumption per 1 centner of meat was 2.99 centners of feed units; labor expenditure was 3.8 man-hours. In 1970, a total of 6.7 billion eggs were produced on poultry farms in the USSR; the total weight gain was 214,600 tons. In 1974, 16 billion eggs were produced, and there was a weight gain of 434,000 tons.

Large poultry farms are found in the United States, Great Britain, France, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Bulgaria, and other countries.