Grabbing the "Chicken" to shake off Poverty and become Rich remember the entrepreneurial dream of poultry farmer Yue Zhanqiang

Eighteen years ago, Yue Zhanqiang, who was born and raised in the Niuxinshan Management Institute of Muling Forestry Bureau, like many post-70s young people, poured into the flood of migrant workers. During his five years as a part-time worker, he worked as a construction worker and porter. With the spirit of being hard-working and daring to challenge, he quickly lifted his family out of poverty and had savings of tens of thousands of yuan.

In early 1993, when he returned to his hometown with start-up funds, he began to think about finding a new way to make money. By chance, Yue Zhanqiang got some information about raising chickens to get rich. After market research, he found that the price of eggs was higher in the market at that time, while raising laying hens with small investment and quick results was sure to make money. With the mentality of giving it a try, Yue Zhanqiang began to prepare for the construction of a chicken farm. He chose the chicken farm in the area with relatively good traffic and location advantages, and converted the abandoned old schools and the idle houses left behind into a chicken farm, saving costs to a certain extent. At first, Yue Zhanqiang raised more than 800 laying hens, but due to insufficient estimation of hidden costs, it took about a year and a half for layers to start laying eggs. There was a serious shortage of funds midway. Under the circumstances that Yue Zhanqiang could not operate, Yue Zhanqiang replaced laying hens with short and fast broilers. Several batches of chicken seedlings purchased all died in batches. As a "layman", the first chicken farm was short of technology and funds. The difficulties are much greater than expected, setbacks and losses come one after another, and I hesitated whether to go back and continue my comfortable life in the city. In the next breeding venture, Yue Zhanqiang tried to hatch chicken seedlings by himself, but also due to poor mastery of provenance and technology, these attempts also failed one by one. "I suffered a terrible loss. There was no new capital injection. I was very desperate at that time." Later, when he had no funds, he borrowed from his relatives and friends, and without technology, he earnestly studied the market, conducted extensive and in-depth market research, and learned his skills from teachers. For more than two months, he went to more than a dozen farms, visited experienced teachers and professional farmers, learned from them, and achieved good economic benefits. Having initially tasted the joy of success, he strengthened his confidence and determination to take the road of raising chickens to become rich.

People who know poultry farmers all know that epidemic prevention is the top priority in poultry breeding, which requires a lot of energy, otherwise it will be difficult to succeed. Yue Zhanqiang is well aware of this. Yue Zhanqiang, who is educated in junior high school, quickly mastered the breeding technology by strengthening online learning. and in continuous practice, to find out the best way to treat chicken intestinal diseases and respiratory diseases. He personally kept watch in the chicken shed, adjusting the temperature, cleaning up the crowded flocks of chickens to prevent chicks from frostbite and trampling, which lasted three nights in a row. Epidemic prevention for chickens is even more careless. During the two months after the chickens came out of their shells, he had to take turns to prevent the chickens every seven days, and at most 500 chickens had to be vaccinated every day. After that, the chickens were injected with bird flu vaccine in turn every two months until the chickens came out of the pen.

From 1994 to the present, he has done it himself on key links. He said that hands-on chicken epidemic prevention, first, can reduce breeding costs, second, is conducive to a comprehensive grasp of the health status of chickens, and third, can accumulate breeding experience. Yue Zhanqiang feeds laying hens with corn, rice and rice bran purchased from the homes of forest farm workers without any pollution. Because he is studious and willing to bear hardships, he soon mastered the key skills of raising each link very well, and the development of his laying hen breeding industry also began to step into the fast lane.

Now, because of the technical guarantee, Yue Zhanqiang's chicken raising scale has been increasing, and has grown from 500 in the first year to 1000 in the second year and more than 1500 in the third year. Up to now there are more than 3500. In the eyes of the staff and workers, Yue Zhanqiang is a "chicken king." he spends almost every day with chickens. Every morning, carrying a bag full of feed, he goes into the chicken farm with a cry, and the laying hens are like stars, concentrating and staring at him.

"in 2017, he plans to build a breeding site with a scale of up to 5000 animals, try to develop under-forest farming methods, and strive for a breakthrough in annual egg production." when talking about future development, Yue Zhanqiang is full of confidence.