Removable poultry nest bottoms of variable widths

A unitary synthetic resin nest bottom is molded in one piece with living hinges between side portions and a bottom portion, so that the side portions may be hinged upwardly to accommodate one nest bottom that was molded in one mold to various width nests. A plurality of ribs are provided for reinforcing the nest bottom and for spacing the nest bottom from the nest.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
Nests for domestic fowl are generally manufactured in at least three sizes. 
Generally, a poultry farmer will purchase the appropriate size of nest for 
the type of bird that is being raised, for example, breeders. This is 
generally an economic decision and is made with a view towrads raising 
more of the smaller birds in a given size building. Generally, the nest 
bottoms are made of metal and are removable to allow for cleaning after 
the birds are marketed. Sometimes the metal is sized for the particular 
nest and other times a larger size piece of metal is purchased with the 
sides and the bottoms being bent upward to fit the bottom of the nest 
structure. The metal bottoms have a serious drawback in that the metal 
tends to deteriorate in a relatively short period of time due to the 
chemical composition and decomposition of the excreta and its reaction 
with the metal. 
SUMMARY 
It is an object of the present invention to provide an economical nest 
bottom that will overcome any of the above-mentioned disadvantages of the 
prior art. 
More particularly, the present invention employs a one-piece unitary 
synthetic resin plastic nest bottom that may be bent to different sizes, 
so that economically one nest bottom may be used to form a plurality of 
different-sized nests according to the particular needs at the time, while 
efficiently forming a plurality of nests having an overall minimum size. 
The life expectancy of the plastic is much greater than that of metal in 
this particular environment. Since the nest bottom is adaptable to 
different sizes, only one mold need be used for a plurality of nest bottom 
sizes, and further only one nest bottom need be kept in inventory to 
maintain stock supplies, which are considerable economic advantages. The 
variable width nest bottom is accomplished by having a rigid center bottom 
portion and two rigid side portions of the nest bottom attached to each 
other by means of parallel thin flexible portions of the plastic, that is, 
living hinges. The thin flexible portion of the device acts as a hinge 
between the center portions and the side portions to allow the side 
portions to be bent upwardly along the hinge, thus allowing one nest 
bottom to be used in most nest sizes. Rigid side walls are provided at the 
ends of the bottom portion. Ribs are provided for reinforcing and spacing 
of the bottom portion and side portions from the nest.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION 
The nest bottom consists of side portions 1 hingedly secured by means of 
thin-wall living hinges 2 to opposite longitudinal sides of a central 
rectangular bottom portion 3, and reinforcing ribs. The reinforcing ribs 
are of a plurality of types; namely, five parallel ribs extending 
downwardly from the central bottom portion; ribs extending downwardly from 
the side portions, as shown in FIG. 1, and rigid wall ribs extending 
upwardly from the opposite ends of the bottom portion between the side 
portions. 
The nest bottom is molded in one piece in a single mold from a soft inert 
plastic, such as polypropylene or polyethylene, in a normal or unstressed 
position as shown in FIG. 1. The thin, flexible hinge portions extend 
continuously along the opposite longitudinal sides of the central bottom 
portion to allow the side portions 1 to be bent upward along the hinges to 
various angular positions from the flat coplanar position of FIG. 1 to a 
vertical position, so as to provide different widths between such 
positions. Thereby, one nest bottom may be used in most size nests. The 
plastic nest bottoms are much easier to clean, maintain, installed and 
removed than the previously known metal nest bottoms. Also, the life of a 
plastic nest bottom can be expected to be many times that of a metal nest 
bottom, due to the lack of chemical reaction between excreta of the birds 
and the nest bottom. 
The present invention overcomes known problems, primarily: (a) the various 
size nests require the manufacture of several size molds for injection 
purposes in other known plastic nest bottoms; and (b) the manufacture, 
stocking, warehousing, and distributing of various size nest bottoms of a 
rigidly plastic type known in the prior art is much more expensive than 
for the nest bottom of the present invention wherein only one size nest 
bottom may be easily adapted by being bent to various size nests. 
Consequently, the present invention is made to overcome the drawbacks of 
the prior art mentioned above with respect to multiple size nests. The 
present nest bottom fits most domestic fowl nests. The entire nest bottom 
consists of synthetic resin molded in one piece in one mold in one 
injection molding process. Since the nest bottoms are of variable widths, 
only one mold is necessary and only one item may be stocked, warehoused, 
and distributed for a plurality of nest sizes. 
The bottom portion 3 and side portions 1 comprise planar sheet material 
having a common flat top surface in the unstressed normal position of FIG 
1. The hinge portions 2 are of thinner sheet material and flexible to 
allow the side portions 1 to be folded in an upward manner relative to the 
bottom portion 3, as shown in FIG. 2, to provide for the various width 
nests. The material of the hinges 2 is such as to prevent breakage due to 
material fatigue, while providing for the resilient hinging, and they are 
sufficiently thick to allow for flexibility. 
To ensure the rigidity of the bottom portion 3 and the side portions 1, 
variously reinforcing ribs 4 are molded both to the bottom portion 3 and 
to the side portions 1 in the same molding process as previously 
described, so as to extend downwardly as shown in FIG. 1. 
It may be seen from FIG. 1 that the ribs 4 that form the rigid upstanding 
side or end walls are such that two rigid side wall portions are located 
closely adjacent, but spaced from each other in a direction perpendicular 
to the hinges 2, in the central portion of the end wall of the bottom 
portion, and in turn they are spaced in a direction parallel to the hinges 
from outer rigid wall portions that are respectively adjacent to the 
hinges 2. The ribs that extend downwardly from the bottom portion are 
generally vertically lined with the spacings between adjacent rigid wall 
portions and the hinges, so as to provide for rigidity of the structure. 
The downwardly depending ribs 4 space the bottom portion and the side 
portions respectively from the bottom and sides of the nest. 
While a preferred embodiment has been described in detail, further 
embodiments, modifications, and variations are all contemplated according 
to the spirit and scope of the present invention as defined by the 
following claims.