Cleaning down between cycles
The next flock inherits whatever the last one left. Downtime is not idle time — it is the cheapest disease control available, and the first thing farms cut.
Awaiting veterinary review. This guide is written from published industry practice and has not yet been checked by our domain advisor. Confirm anything clinical with your own veterinarian before acting on it.
When rates are good, the pressure to place the next batch quickly is enormous. A shed that could be earning is standing empty. It is exactly the wrong instinct: an empty shed is doing work, and the work is breaking the disease cycle between flocks.
The order matters
Disinfectant applied to a dirty surface does almost nothing. Organic matter — litter, dust, droppings, feed residue — inactivates most disinfectants on contact. Cleaning is not a step before disinfection; it is most of the job.
- Remove everything. All litter, all feed, all droppings. Do not leave a heap by the shed door.
- Dry clean. Sweep and brush down from the roof to the floor — ceiling, beams, fans, ledges, curtains, walls, then the floor. Dust on a beam carries pathogens perfectly well.
- Wash with detergent. This is the step most often skipped. Detergent lifts the organic film that plain water leaves behind.
- Rinse and let it dry.
- Disinfect. Now, and only now, apply the disinfectant, at label dilution and with the contact time the label specifies.
- Dry again, then rest the shed.
Equipment, not just the building
Drinker lines, feeder pans, brooders, fans, crates, boots, the feed store and the vehicle that goes in and out. Drinker lines especially — biofilm inside a water line survives everything you do to the floor and reseeds the next flock. Flush and sanitise the lines with a product intended for it.
Anything that cannot be cleaned, and anything wooden and soaked, should be replaced rather than disinfected.
Downtime
A rest period with the shed empty, clean and dry is what actually reduces the pathogen load. Two weeks is the figure most commonly recommended — longer after a disease outbreak, and the shed should be dry before the next chicks arrive, not merely empty.
If you place chicks into a shed that was washed yesterday, you have given the next flock a cold, damp start and none of the benefit.
Downtime is also the only reliable interruption for Eimeria oocysts, darkling beetles and the litter-borne organisms that survive between cycles.
Darkling beetles
Rarely discussed and genuinely important. The litter beetle survives cleaning by moving into the floor, walls and insulation, and it carries Salmonella, E. coli and IBD virus from one flock to the next. Treat while the litter is still in the shed or immediately after removal, before the beetles migrate into the structure.
All-in all-out
Everything above only works if the site empties completely. A multi-age site never has a clean break: the older flock reinfects the younger one, and no amount of washing between batches fixes it.
This is the single biggest structural difference between farms that have recurring disease and farms that do not.
A biosecurity protocol you will actually follow →
Before the chicks come back
- Shed dry, not damp
- Fresh, dry, mould-free litter at the right depth
- Floor and litter preheated — 24–48 hours ahead in cold weather
- Water lines flushed, water cool and clean
- Feed in place, chick paper down