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Charlton Farm - Telford, England

2015

Hydor completed a new build, equipment supply and installation for Shed 6 at Charlton Farm in Walcot, Wellington, Telford which has significantly increased the bird population of the farm by 41,000 to a total of 195,000.

Nick Gwynne explained his reasoning for the new shed: “Modern poultry farming demands increased production and efficiencies. In this business climate you have to keep doing more to get the same return. Poultry margins are tight so you need to keep doing more. Put simply you need more birds to keep your profit at the same level.”

“We wanted to expand our poultry production and the time was right. I had heard of plans for a new housing estate just down the road from the farm, so I decided I would do it now to avoid any future complications with planning permission. Broadly, I knew what I wanted in the shed and approached Hydor with my plans. I wanted some simple features, like putting up a floodlight at the far end of the shed. Hydor also came back to me with some further good ideas based on their experience,” said Nick.

There are also four tunnel fans at the end of the shed which help to keep the birds cool in extreme conditions.

“Our ventilation configuration is ‘side inlet and roof outlet’ so the fans haven’t got to pull the air as far for the birds to get fresh air. Our building eaves stand at 9ft high opposed to the more common 8ft 6”.

Most of the work was completed in a four week time frame, co-ordinated as builders, roofers and other suppliers completed their work before finally carrying out systems testing and commissioning. Everything was completed and fired up three days before the birds arrived.

Hydor continue to help Nick to grow accustomed to the sophisticated control panel driven by a Rotem computer. Nick said: “I am mastering it now thanks to ongoing support from  the Hydor team. The basics you can do easily and there are many other layers that enable so many different things to aid productivity and reducing man hours. All my other sheds, except one, are manual.

“I’m very happy with the new shed and especially with the support I have had from Hydor. The most important thing they have given me peace of mind. I know that when I need something fixed or I need information, they are always available. It means I can spend my time running the farm and not worrying about other things.”

Equipment supplied:

  • Control panel
  • 5 hot water coils
  • 20 AgriJets
  • 4 HV1250 belt drive fans
  • 4 auger winch motors
  • 4 auger line motors
  • 1 cross auger
  • 1 wheat auger
  • External service lighting
  • Dimmable dawn to dusk poultry house lighting

Electrical connections of Patchwork Biomass boilers, main shed supply and connections into existing alarm circuits, test and inspection.