Inside a 320,000-Layer Multi-Story Poultry House in Fujian, China

Within a 600,000-layer farm in Nanping, Fujian Province, Henan Daofeng Livestock Equipment Co., Ltd. executed a newly built poultry house designed for 320,000 laying hens. The building has four operational floors, and each floor follows a six-row, six-tier equipment layout.

This is not simply a conventional layer house made taller. It is a multi-story layer farm project in which the building, layer equipment, material movement, environmental control and daily management routes must be planned as one operating system.

The project illustrates an important direction in commercial egg production: when available land is limited or farm capacity is expanding, vertical organization can create additional production space. However, a multi-story layout only supports efficient operation when every floor can be supplied, monitored, cleaned, maintained and managed reliably.

Figure 1. Exterior view of the four-floor layer house in Nanping, Fujian, showing the building’s vertically organized operating levels.

Project Facts at a Glance

· Project location: Nanping, Fujian Province, China
· Overall farm scale: 600,000 laying hens
· Featured new poultry house: 320,000 laying hens
· Building arrangement: four floors
· Equipment layout on each floor: six rows
· Equipment height on each floor: six tiers
· Project model: multi-story smart layer farming
· Project executor: Henan Daofeng Livestock Equipment Co., Ltd.

The distinction between the two capacity figures is important. The entire farm is planned for 600,000 laying hens, while this article focuses on one newly built multi-story poultry house designed for 320,000 birds. Keeping this distinction clear helps overseas buyers compare project scale, building scope and equipment quantities correctly.

What Does “Four Floors, Six Rows and Six Tiers” Mean?

The four floors describe the building. The six rows and six tiers describe the layer-equipment arrangement installed on each floor. These are different design dimensions and should not be combined into one cage-height figure.

On every operational floor:

· six equipment rows organize the poultry-house width;
· six equipment tiers use the internal height of that floor;
· service aisles provide access for inspection and maintenance;
· feeding, drinking, egg handling, manure handling, ventilation, lighting and controls must reach the required operating areas;
· interfaces connect that floor to the building-wide supply and discharge systems.

This distinction matters during procurement. A supplier cannot calculate a reliable capacity or quotation from the words “four-floor poultry house” alone. The calculation also needs the approved row length, equipment model, compartment arrangement, stocking plan, aisle widths, service spaces and connection points.

Buyers planning a comparable stacked system can review our H-type layer cage system as a starting point, but the final configuration must always be matched to the individual building and operating plan.

Figure 2. The long side of the multi-story poultry house demonstrates why every floor requires coordinated air, service and equipment interfaces.

Why a Multi-Story Layer House Is More Than Stacked Equipment

A single-floor poultry house mainly coordinates systems along its length and width. A four-floor poultry house adds a third planning direction: systems and people must also move vertically.

That changes the engineering questions.

How does feed reach each floor? How are eggs transferred without creating unnecessary handling points? Where does manure leave the equipment and the building? How is air distributed and exhausted at different elevations? How can technicians reach motors, belts, drinker lines, sensors and emergency controls? What happens to the other floors if one subsystem stops?

The value of a multi-story concept therefore comes from coordination, not height by itself. A tall building with poorly matched subsystems can create bottlenecks. A coordinated building can organize capacity while keeping daily tasks visible, repeatable and serviceable.

Our first-hand project photographs show the relationship between the building shell, separate operating floors, equipment rows and service areas. More completed and ongoing installations are available in our project reference library.

Figure 3. Repeated floor levels and exterior service access form part of the operating structure of the multi-story layer house.

Building and Equipment Must Be Designed Together

In a project of this scale, the poultry house should not be completed first and treated as an empty shell for equipment to fit later. Structural design and equipment layout influence each other from the beginning.

The building team and equipment team should coordinate:

· structural bay spacing and equipment anchoring positions;
· clear height on every operational floor;
· floor loading and equipment support requirements;
· equipment-entry and lifting routes;
· aisle widths and maintenance clearances;
· openings for feed, egg and manure transfer;
· ventilation inlets, outlets, ducts and fan positions;
· electrical distribution, controls, sensors and cable routes;
· drainage, cleaning and biosecurity zoning;
· stairs, platforms, guardrails and emergency access;
· fire, safety and local approval requirements.

Early coordination reduces the risk of discovering that a beam conflicts with an equipment row, an opening is in the wrong position or a transfer route is too narrow after construction. Our poultry farm design and layout planningexplains how project layout, equipment matching, installation and after-sales responsibilities can be coordinated before delivery.

Figure 4. Interior service areas require enough clearance for equipment access, inspection and routine maintenance on every floor.

Five Flows That Determine Daily Operating Efficiency

1. Feed Flow

Feed must move from storage and conveying equipment to the correct floor, row and feeding line. The design should define how feed is divided between floors, how distribution is checked and how one section can be isolated for maintenance.

Uniform delivery cannot be assumed from the existence of an automatic feeding line. Motor selection, conveying distance, line coordination, feed characteristics, sensor placement and operating sequence all affect system behavior. Trial operation should therefore be completed before normal flock management begins.

2. Egg Flow

Eggs travel from the cage fronts to collection belts and then toward a floor-level or building-level transfer route. Each additional transfer point must be accessible for inspection and cleaning.

The design objective is not merely to move eggs quickly. It is to create a controlled route with stable belt alignment, appropriate transitions and a clear destination. Equipment drawings should show how the egg flow from all four floors connects to the collection or handling area.

3. Manure Flow

Each equipment tier needs a defined manure-removal path. The individual belts, cross conveyors, vertical transfer equipment and final discharge point must work as one chain.

For farms that also need to reduce manure moisture or prepare material for further use, the discharge strategy can be coordinated with a poultry manure drying system. Whether drying equipment is appropriate depends on manure volume, house exhaust conditions, site layout, environmental requirements and the farm’s end-use plan.

4. Air Flow

A four-floor house should not be treated as four unrelated rooms or as one large undivided air space without calculation. Every operational level needs a planned air path.

Ventilation design should consider air entry, distribution, exhaust, pressure differences, heat and moisture loads, equipment resistance, seasonal conditions and emergency operation. Sensor positions should represent the areas where birds are actually housed, not only convenient wall locations.

The photographs show repeated exterior openings and enclosed building surfaces, but the complete ventilation design and performance settings are project documents rather than assumptions that can be derived from a photograph.

5. People and Information Flow

Smart farming still depends on trained operators. Staff need safe routes to inspect every floor, recognize abnormal conditions and respond before a small fault becomes a building-wide interruption.

Daily information may include feed and water status, environmental readings, alarms, motor conditions, belt tracking, egg movement and manure removal. A useful control system should make these conditions visible and support a clear response process. Automation without inspection routines, alarm responsibilities and maintenance records does not create intelligent management by itself.

Figure 5. A service area beside the equipment illustrates the need for practical inspection, cleaning and maintenance routes.

How Can a Multi-Story Layer Farm Support Profitability?

The phrase “high-efficiency profit model” should be explained carefully. A building does not guarantee profit because it has more floors, and equipment does not guarantee profit because it is automatic.

Profitability is influenced by a group of connected operating factors:

· land and building utilization;
· actual usable bird capacity;
· equipment availability and downtime;
· feed distribution and feed losses;
· water reliability and leakage control;
· egg handling and avoidable damage;
· manure removal and waste-management cost;
· energy consumption;
· labor organization and maintenance workload;
· flock health, biosecurity and management quality;
· financing, egg prices and local input costs.

A multi-story system can create a more organized production platform, but its commercial result depends on how well these factors are managed over time. For this reason, Henan Daofeng does not calculate a buyer’s return from a generic number of floors or tiers. A responsible financial evaluation requires the local construction budget, equipment scope, utility prices, labor costs, production assumptions, financing terms and market conditions.

This transparent approach is more useful to investors than publishing an unsupported payback promise.

Figure 6. Long equipment rows inside the layer house require coordinated feeding, drinking, egg, manure, lighting and inspection systems.

What Overseas Buyers Should Confirm Before Requesting a Quotation

An accurate proposal for a multi-story layer house needs more information than target capacity. Buyers should prepare:

· project country and exact location;
· total farm capacity and capacity per building;
· available land and poultry-house dimensions;
· number of building floors;
· preferred rows and equipment tiers on each floor;
· local climate and environmental design conditions;
· bird breed and stocking requirements;
· required feeding, drinking, egg and manure systems;
· feed-storage and conveying plan;
· egg destination and handling process;
· manure discharge, storage, drying or treatment plan;
· available voltage, frequency, water supply and backup power;
· preferred control and monitoring functions;
· building scope and equipment-supplier scope;
· unloading, installation and commissioning responsibilities;
· operator training, spare parts and after-sales requirements;
· required delivery and production schedule.

The quotation should state what is included, what is excluded and which interfaces are supplied by other contractors. In a four-floor building, unclear interface responsibility can affect several floors at once.

Commissioning Should Be Verified Floor by Floor and as One Building

Before full operation, each floor should be checked individually. Equipment structure, feed movement, water pressure, egg belts, manure belts, lighting, sensors, motors, alarms and safety components should be tested according to the approved manuals and project requirements.

The building must then be tested as an integrated system. Simultaneous demand from four floors may expose electrical, conveying, ventilation or control issues that are not visible when one floor is operated alone.

A practical handover should include:

· approved drawings and final equipment layout;
· equipment and motor lists;
· operating and maintenance manuals;
· test and commissioning records;
· alarm and emergency-response procedures;
· spare-parts recommendations;
· operator training records;
· warranty and after-sales contact information.

These records turn a completed installation into a manageable long-term asset.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is this a 600,000-layer building or a 320,000-layer building?

The entire Nanping farm has a scale of 600,000 laying hens. This case study focuses on a newly built multi-story poultry house designed for 320,000 hens.

How is the 320,000-layer house arranged?

The poultry house has four operational floors. Each floor is configured with six equipment rows and six equipment tiers.

Does “four floors” mean four cage tiers?

No. Four floors refers to the building levels. Six tiers refers to the height of the layer-equipment arrangement installed on each floor.

Is every system in the project fully automatic?

The project is positioned as a smart, vertically organized layer-farming facility. However, this article does not list a complete contractual automation scope. Feeding, drinking, egg collection, manure removal, ventilation, controls and other systems should be confirmed from the approved equipment schedule.

Why use a multi-story poultry house?

A multi-story design can organize a large capacity vertically and make more intensive use of the building footprint. Its suitability depends on land, construction cost, structure, equipment configuration, environmental design, logistics, management capability and local requirements.

Does a multi-story design guarantee higher profit?

No building form guarantees profit. Commercial performance depends on investment, reliable operation, flock management, input costs, market prices, losses, labor organization and many other project-specific factors.

Can the same six-row, six-tier layout be copied for another country?

Not automatically. House dimensions, climate, regulations, power supply, manure strategy, operating method, bird requirements and construction practices must be reviewed for every project.

What information does Daofeng need to prepare a proposal?

At minimum, provide the country, target capacity, building dimensions or available land, number of floors, preferred layout, climate, automation requirements, manure plan, utilities and installation scope.

Planning a Commercial Multi-Story Layer Farm?

Henan Daofeng Livestock Equipment Co., Ltd. can coordinate layer-house layout, equipment configuration, production preparation, delivery support, installation guidance and commissioning requirements around the actual conditions of the buyer’s project.

To begin, send us:

· your country and project location;
· target capacity per poultry house;
· land plan or building dimensions;
· preferred number of floors;
· automation requirements;
· climate and utility information;
· manure-handling plan;
· project schedule.

Request a project-specific layer farm proposal based on your actual capacity, building and operating requirements.

AUTHOR: Zhao Jinhong

COMPANY: Henan Daofeng Livestock Equipment Co., Ltd.

PROJECT LOCATION: Nanping, Fujian Province, China

PROJECT SCOPE SHOWN: One newly built 320,000-layer, four-floor poultry house within a 600,000-layer farm