WHAT IS PASTURE AND WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO RAISE POULTRY ON PASTURE?

The impact of 50 birds per pen in 24 hours with being moved every morning

There are various definitions of pasture but the basic understanding is that pasture is land that is intensively managed specifically for the purpose of grazing and feeding livestock. The land may be covered in grasses, or contain some legumes and other plants suitable for providing grazing and forage. Those grasses may be native or cultivated.

This then leads to further exploration of what does it mean to raise poultry on pasture? Is it that they have free access to grass? Free range backyard style chickens?

Pasture raised poultry is not simply chickens allowed to roam on an area of grass or even backyard lawn. They need to be on a specifically managed pasture that is reserved and managed for the purposes of feeding livestock. By definition then, poultry cannot just have free access to the whole area if it is being managed. They will need to be contained in a certain area so that their impact is managed, some areas of pasture are rested, others are intensively foraged on, and the poultry should be moved. Therefore, pasture raised poultry are continuously mobile to prevent too much fertilisation, manure build up and damaging their favourite spots from overuse. They never sleep, poop or eat in the same place. The manure from chickens especially is very good for building and fertilising soil, but overtime, too much of a good thing becomes bad. Management is essential to protect and build soil.

Regenerative farmers would normally then seed behind the animals with a cover crop to ensure growth of the forage available, build topsoil and organic matter in the soil. Leaving your chickens to run around freely on any given grass patch does not constitute pasture raised poultry. The pasture and the poultry need to be intensively managed. Grass that is not managed runs the risk of being damaged and dying, leading to bare earth, microbiology of the soil is exposed to the elements, resulting in dead soil.