What Are the Prospects for Meat Pigeon Farming? A Detailed Guide to Farming Methods
Meat pigeons, also called squabs, refer to young pigeons within 4 weeks of age. Their characteristics are: large body size, rich nutrition, high medicinal value; they are a premium tonic and nutritious food. The meat is tender and delicious, ranking first among meat products. Testing has shown that squab contains more than 17 kinds of amino acids, with total amino acids reaching as high as 53.9%, and it contains more than 10 types of trace elements and multiple vitamins.
The Prospects for Meat Pigeon Farming
Meat pigeon farming has a short cycle, low cost, quick returns and high benefits. It is a farming enterprise with great development prospects and also a good project for getting rich quickly.
The cost of raising meat pigeons is much lower than that of raising broiler chickens. Counting from when the parent pigeon lays eggs, after 17-18 days of incubation and 24 days of brooding, they can be sold; the rearing period is extremely short. One breeding pigeon consumes 40 grams of feed per day, and one lactating pigeon consumes 75 grams of feed per day. From hatching to sale at 30 days of age, a squab consumes a total of 1000-1500 grams of feed, making feed usage very economical. In addition, protein feed is currently expensive; the protein proportion in broiler chicken feed is as high as about 20%, while the protein proportion in meat pigeon feed needs to be only 13%. If meat pigeons are raised on a large-scale intensive basis, their feed cost is clearly lower than that of broiler chicks.
The incubation period of pigeons is 17-18 days. Squabs are initially fed pigeon milk from the crop of the parent pigeons, then gradually transition from half milk and half grain to being fed soaked grain. Meat squabs grow extremely fast, reaching a body weight of 500-700 grams at 25-30 days of age. Taking each pair of breeding pigeons producing 6 pairs per year as an example, at the purchase price currently offered by foreign trade departments, after deducting feed costs, medicine costs and management fees, raising one pair of breeding pigeons can yield a profit of 100-150 yuan per year. If squabs are selectively bred and sold as reserve breeding pigeons at 2-5 months of age, the profits are even greater.
Issues to Watch in Developing Meat Pigeon Farming
1. Raisers must have a basic understanding and knowledge of the pigeon industry market. Squabs entering the market have requirements for age in days, weight and specifications, as well as commodity standard restrictions on carcass skin color. Domestic and international commodity markets require squabs to be under 28 days of age, with a gross weight above 550 grams and a white carcass.
2. Good breeding pigeon varieties must be selected. First, they must be white breeding pigeons; at the same time, the local market can be considered, and silver, gray, red and other varieties may be appropriately chosen, but the carcass must be pure white. At present, relatively good domestic varieties include White King pigeons, Deep King, White Carneau pigeons, etc., but the key is that improved breeding pigeons are required to have good reproductive performance, producing 12——20 squabs per year, in order to achieve better benefits. Pigeons fall under the scope of breeding poultry management. Units selling breeding pigeons must hold a breeding poultry production and operation license, and breeding units must issue a breeding pigeon qualification certificate for the breeding pigeons they sell. Farmer friends must clearly understand the situation of the supplier unit before purchasing breeding pigeons.
3. Raising meat pigeons is a highly scientific technique. Do not blindly introduce stock before truly mastering the rearing technique. You should first go to a breeding unit to study and train in the technique, and then start raising them. Beginners had best introduce paired production pigeons that are currently laying eggs, incubating and lactating and are under 2 years old. Blindly pursuing cheaper young pigeons is not suitable for beginner pigeon raisers, because young pigeons have relatively weaker constitutions; if technique and management cannot keep up, it will cause an imbalance of males and females and an unclear production situation. Moreover, from young pigeon to breeding pigeon there is still a selection and breeding stage, and a portion still needs to be culled.