Wet weather all across the mid Atlantic region has prompted more calls for row crop flaming equipment this year.

With a Row crop flamer you can control weeds in the crop row and in between the rows without the use of chemicals.
You won't disturb the soil like you do with mechanical cultivating for weed control so you are not churning up new weed seeds and there's less weed germination.
Even in moist conditions, if you can get a tractor in the field, you can effectively flame. If it rains just after flaming – that’s okay!

The best time to flame weeds is while they are still small.

Order your row crop flamer, vegetable bed flamer or other flaming equipment early, before you have a “weed-mergency”!

How much does it cost to sanitize a poultry house with the Red Dragon poultry house sanitizer?

The fuel tank on a poultry house flame sanitizer holds one hundred gallons of propane.

The poultry house sanitizer attaches to the three point hitch of your tractor and has six LT 2 x 8 Liquid Propane torches under an insulated steel hood. When operating the poultry house sanitizer, the temperature on the outside of the hood is generally around 2 – 300 degrees Fahrenheit. Under the hood the temperature is anywhere from 1400 – 2050 degrees Fahrenheit.

That heat works to remove moisture, pathogens, insects and their eggs and larvae as well as a whole lot of ammonia.

How long will a tank of propane last when sanitizing your poultry house?

We have seen fuel consumption of approximately 25 gallons when flaming a 40’ x 500’ house with the tractor moving at ½ mile per hour.

Using 25 gallons (a quarter tank) of propane for a 20,000 square foot poultry house equals 1.25 gallons per 1000 square feet.
At $2.00 per gallon for propane, your looking at $2.50 per 1000 square feet.
That's 0.0025 cents per square foot!

A grower I know once told me that he spent $225.00 for wind rowing, $250.00 for A7 in the starting end, plus $75.00 for insecticide.
That’s $550.00 of his hard earned dollars.

If you are paying $2.00 per gallon for propane, even if you are flame sanitizing your house twice after each flock, that would still be a $450.00 savings over the over those chemical applications!

Growers are significantly reducing or eliminating the use of chemicals in their poultry houses and seeing a return on investment on the purchase of their poultry house sanitizer within a year and a half based on cost savings for chemical treatments.

Profit considerations from using a poultry house sanitizer:

• Better feed conversion
• Reduced mortality
• Reduced heating and electricity cost due to the fact that you do not have to ventilate to get rid of ammonia as much in the colder times of year.
• Reduced or eliminated use of acid based chemicals that can corode metal surfaces and affect bird health.
• Bonus payouts

Less dollars out for more dollars in = a good business decision.