Catch day is the most expensive day of the flock — and the one most growers improvise. A planned catch protects everything the grow-out built: low-stress handling limits bruising and condemnation losses, correct feed withdrawal protects carcass quality, and timing the catch out of the heat protects both birds and crew. This page covers the pre-catch plan, the handling practices that keep losses down, and the load records that connect catch day to settlement — because the numbers recorded at the scale are the numbers that end up on the payment sheet.
The Pre-Catch Checklist
| When | Task | Why It Matters |
|---|---|---|
| Day before | Confirm catch time, crew, trucks, and penning with the integrator; repair fans, lights, and gates that the catch will stress | Last-minute equipment failures during a catch cause handling injuries and delays that cascade into heat stress on the trucks |
| Day before | Review mortality, water, and weight records for the flock — know your numbers before the plant asks | Catch-day records reconcile against your grow-out records; surprises are cheaper to find here than at settlement |
| Evening before | Begin feed withdrawal per contract (commonly 8–12 hours); water continues without interruption | An emptied crop reduces gut spillage and contamination at processing; water withdrawal causes suffering and mortality — never restrict water |
| Catch morning | Dim or remove light per low-stress handling practice; keep noise and movement minimal; use sorting gates, not chasing | Darkness calms birds and reduces wing-flapping injuries — the single biggest handling-loss lever |
| At the scale | Record loads by house: bird count, weight where recorded, truck, and time — the records standard | These records reconcile against the settlement sheet and against your exit counts — see the comparison method |
Handling Practices That Limit Losses
- Darkness is the cheapest welfare tool you have. Birds in dim light are quiet birds; quiet birds bruise less. If contract terms allow, catch at night or under dimmed light — it reduces handling injuries, wing breaks, and stress deaths in one move.
- Catch out of the heat. Never catch into peak afternoon heat — birds loaded hot arrive stressed and die on the truck or condemn at the plant. Evening and early-morning catches are the standard for a reason. In summer, the heat stress guide rules apply double on catch day.
- Two birds per hand, legs together, no dragging. Dragging causes the bruising and fractures that turn into plant condemnations and grade deductions — the losses growers never see because they happen after the truck leaves.
- Truck ventilation confirmed before loading. Poultry trailers need airflow; blocked or mis-set shutters turn a 40-minute haul into a mortality event, especially in warm weather.
- Do not mix birds from different houses on one load without telling the plant. Load composition feeds traceability and settlement — keep loads house-pure unless the integrator says otherwise.
The Money at the Scale
Catch-day losses are invisible on the farm and visible on the settlement sheet. Every bruise, fracture, and dead-on-arrival bird is a deduction against live weight that the flock already paid feed to produce. On a 30,000-bird flock, a 0.5-point increase in condemnations and downgrades — a few hundred birds' worth of value — is thousands of dollars, and it is almost always handling, not health. The growers who protect that money are the ones who treat catch day as a managed operation: rehearsed, recorded, and timed out of the heat. The catch economics guide covers the timing decision itself — this page covers executing it without losing birds in the process.
Catch Records in Poultry Log™
Exit counts, load records, and catch-day notes logged in Poultry Log™ sit on the same timeline as the flock's mortality, water, and weight history — which makes the settlement reconciliation a five-minute comparison instead of a reconstruction. The integrator's delivered-count claim, your exit records, and the plant's receiving numbers are the three measurements of the same event; the one you hold is the independent one. See the settlement calculator for what those records are worth at the end of the flock.
- 2026-10-05: Comprehensive rewrite. Pre-catch checklist table, handling practices, catch-day money math, and record linkage — replacing the earlier short note.
- Earlier version: brief note on low-stress handling.