This invention is a system and involved components for staging a series of multi-compartmented,
multi-tier chicken cages and loading them in a chicken house for with a chickens
loader that receives chickens urged by a revolving gathering head onto a first
longitudinal conveyor belt sloped upwardly to a second longitudinal conveyor belt
assembly the distal end of which is vertically and horizontally positional form
pivot positions at the proximal end thereof. A third conveyor system is longitudinally
aligned and slideably mounted on the second conveyor assembly for extension and
retraction. The belts of the three belt conveyors are operated to increase the
speed of the chickens on the belts to a terminal speed in the range of from about
500 to about 1400 feet per minute, for discharge of the chickens into a facing
open compartment of the chicken cage at that terminal speed. Cages are presented
for this high speed loading on a platform having a front end and a longitudinal
centerline, such that the cage doors face in a selected direction towards or away
from said centerline when an empty cage is on a rear portion of the platform on
one side of said centerline, face the front end of the platform transversely to
the centerline at a front portion of the platform for loading with poultry, and
face in the same selected direction towards or away from the centerline at a rear
portion of the platform on a side of the centerline opposite from said one side
for removal of a loaded cage from said platform.
