A UMES Extension 4-H STEM summer project helped a group of youth experience what raising chickens, a major economic driver on the Eastern Shore of Maryland and the Delmarva Peninsula, is all about.
It was an early and odd sort of trunk-or-treat, as Dr. Jennifer Timmons, sat on the back of her car’s hatchback on a sunny afternoon June 4 awaiting youth and their parents to pick up chicks and feed sacks.
It was the first reward for having committed to participating in the inaugural event and attending two meetings providing “expectations of the project, instructions on broiler care and management, and information on biosecurity and animal welfare,” the associate professor of poultry science said.
With chicks in hand, more accurately boxes, the youth went home to raise eight broiler chicks hatched that day and donated by Perdue Farms. The quest was to care for the birds for eight weeks, keeping records of “feed consumption, mortality and bird weights,” Timmons said.
At the end of the grow-out period, the youth selected two of their chickens to show at the Somerset County Fair in Princess Anne, Maryland, on July 28.
Judges for the project, Matt Stevenson and Jessica Crabtree of Clearview Enterprises, and Christen Boyer of Amick Farms, after careful consideration, chose Presley Cooley, 9, of Wicomico County, as the champion poultry grower for birds averaging 9 pounds. First runner-up was awarded to Gabby Wainwright.
Following judging, the chickens were sold at an auction with participants earning $3.50-$4.25 per pound for their birds. The birds were then processed at Ihsan Farms in Princess Anne, Maryland, Timmons said.
“All of the participants seemed to have enjoyed the experience of raising and handling broilers and learning about the poultry industry in the process,” said Ariel Clay, UMES Extension’s 4-H youth development STEM specialist and co-lead on the project.
Gail Stephens, agricultural communications, University of Maryland Eastern Shore, School of Agricultural and Natural Sciences, UMES Extension, gcstephens@umes.edu, 410-621-3850.
Photos by Ariel Clay, UMES Extension 4-H STEM, and Todd Dudek, UMES Agricultural Communications.
Photo caption: Participants in UMES’ youth broiler chicken project, below from left, are: Alivia Harmon (3rd runner-up), Wyatt Harmon (4th runner-up), Anna Wainwright (2nd runner-up), Presley Cooley (champion) and Gabby Wainwright (1st runner-up).
