April 29, 2025

Delaware poultry industry started with Mrs. Steele

By Nat Williams

A large pile of poultry litter sits in a shed on the Thompson farm at Hartly, Del. Poultry producers in the state spread much of the litter they produce on farmed ground, but also ship some to other farmers in the region. A group of Illinois soybean growers visiting the farm just missed seeing a crop of chickens, which were shipped out a week earlier.

DOVER, Del. — Delmarva’s huge poultry industry can be
traced back to a woman who wanted to raise a few chicks.
Back in 1923 Wilma Steele, the wife of a Coast Guard
man, ordered 50 chicks to raise for her family and for a few neighbors, but an
extra zero was put on the order and she received 500. Being a resourceful woman,
she decided to raise that amount and sold them to neighbors for a good
profit.
Her success caught on quickly, and soon the industry
exploded.
Now the peninsula comprising most of Delaware and parts
of Maryland and Virginia produces more than a half billion chickens annually.
One of Delaware’s three counties — Sussex — produces
more poultry than any other county in the United States. Perdue Farms — one of
the nation’s largest producers of broilers — has a large presence in the county
and contracts with many of the growers here.
Of the 2,500 growers in the state, about 800 have
poultry houses, reports Secretary of Agriculture Ed Kee. Most have one or two
houses, though some larger farms have several.
It isn’t cheap to get into the business: Each chicken
house requires an investment of about $350,000. Kee said that 115 building
permits for new chicken houses have been issued over the past 12 months.
The Robert Thompson family at Hartley has two chicken
houses, each 66 feet wide by 600 feet long, with total capacity of about 120,000
birds.
The sons — Aaron and Jonathon — raise 60-day broilers
and try to turn them over five times annually. The bedding material is
kiln-dried wood shavings and the litter is trucked out regularly
The uptick in production is a result of lower feed costs
coupled with higher demand, Kee said.
“Our poultry industry is really based on our proximity
to consumers,” he said. “In an eight-hour truck ride we have 90 to 100 million
people. Every night, five nights a week, we have 175 to 200 tractor-trailers
leaving Delmarva poultry plants with fresh chicken going to chain stores from
Miami to Maine all the out to Pittsburgh down to Kentucky.”
Nat Williams can be reached at 618-932-3041 or
nwilliams@agrinews-pubs.com. Follow him on Twitter at: @AgNews_Williams.
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