We look at multiple weather sites for information to plan our days and weeks on the pheasant farm. Generally, the Weather Channel, Accu Weather, and Wunderground, are our sources. We combine the forecasts and try to make rational decisions about our work and bird safety. Everything from warm rain to cold rain, snow and the wind affect our birds and the decisions we make!
Reasons to Check the Weather
Every week from April thru early October we have a group of pheasants to move from the brooder barns to outside pens. We have scheduled hatches of chicks arriving from the hatchery that need to go in the barn! If we are too cautious with the weather-related decisions, we can end up way behind schedule. If we send them outside when it is too wet and cold we can lose a lot of birds. You can understand why we check multiple sources!
Bird move-outs
- We want to make sure we have a three-day window without rain and lows above 50 degrees before we move young birds from the barn to the pens.
- We also check for wind direction to determine how to place huts in the pens.
Planning our Work-week for Productivity
- When we will have rainy days, we schedule inside jobs like peeping or sanitizing.
- In the winter, we check snow fall predictions, to determine if we need to drop the nets in the pens. Pen nets will collapse with too much heavy, wet snow.
- Planning mature deliveries means we need to load our truck according to the weather birds will encounter on their delivery route and destination.
If you would like to learn more about the importance of double checking multiple sources for weather forecasts you should talk to Brian Klein or Troy Cisewski on our farm. They are getting quite used to making weather related decisions!
