By: Animistic Team, Tuesday 15th, 2025
Even seasoned animal scientists can find themselves lost in translation when stepping into a new species, especially when it comes to understanding poultry terminology. Take it from our President and Founder, Dr. Casey L. Bradley, whose early career was rooted in swine nutrition. After earning her Ph.D., her first role at Kalmbach Feeds, Inc. in Upper Sandusky, Ohio, required her to quickly become a multi-species nutritionist and poultry researcher—a classic sink-or-swim moment.
One rookie mistake still sticks with her:
“I kept calling a battery cage a pen while working with a consultant on a research protocol. He looked at me, confused, because in poultry, a ‘pen’ refers to floor pen trials, not cages. I didn’t realize that unit of replication terminology didn’t translate across species.”
But it wasn’t just terminology. What caught her by surprise was the behavioral complexity in poultry genetics. Having spent years working with swine genetics—managing several commercial lines and understanding their impacts on feed intake, growth, and reproductive traits—she took for granted how much she had learned in pigs.
Suddenly, she was navigating layer breeds where genetic lines behaved differently in the same housing systems. She found herself learning the hard way how an aviary system could trigger very different behaviors than a cage or floor pen system, much like the open housing versus pen housing debates in swine.
These experiences revealed something universal: whether pigs or poultry, genetics and environment shape behavior, and if you don’t understand the production system, you’ll miss the full picture.
Dr. Bradley’s experiences are not unique, and in fact, they’re mild compared to the challenges others face when crossing disciplines in the animal agriculture world. What’s more, the learning curve goes both ways.
She recalls one of her first struggles when stepping into the business side of the industry: trying to make sense of balance sheets, financial models, and the endless abbreviations that dominate business conversations. Despite holding a Ph.D. in animal nutrition, she found herself learning a completely new language, one she hadn’t been taught in grad school.
She also saw the reverse happen countless times. Brilliant business leaders and colleagues wanted to participate in technical discussions, contribute ideas in strategy meetings, and better serve their customers—but they were held back by their lack of fluency in the language of the barn. Terms like “feed conversion ratio,” “phase feeding,” or “coccidiosis challenge” made conversations feel like foreign territory.
Both sides reflect the same truth: people become highly skilled in one part of the industry, but without shared poultry terminology, essential communication breaks down across disciplines.
It’s not a failure of effort—it’s a reflection of how our educational paths diverge. A doctorate in animal nutrition and an MBA are two distinct journeys, each with its own unique language.
Recognizing this gap, Dr. Bradley began developing her “Lingo” courses, practical training designed to bridge the technical and commercial worlds. What started in the swine industry has now expanded to poultry and will soon be applied to other species in animal agriculture and even the pet industry.
Because no matter your role—whether you’re in sales, marketing, finance, or nutrition—understanding the language of your industry empowers you to connect, contribute, and lead with confidence.
Poultry Lingo was born from a simple, but powerful, realization: language shouldn’t be a barrier to collaboration. Whether you’re on the sales team, managing customer accounts, designing marketing campaigns, or providing technical service, you need to understand the world your customers live in—the barn (or is it house).
Poultry Lingo isn’t a deep-dive technical training for veterinarians or nutritionists. It’s a practical, approachable way to help non-technical professionals gain confidence in the key poultry terms, production systems, and challenges of the poultry industry.
It breaks down essential topics like:
Poultry Lingo is more than a vocabulary list. It’s a practical foundation for learning poultry terminology in context. It’s designed to help your teams understand how these pieces fit together, how a genetic line affects bird behavior, how housing impacts animal welfare and performance, and how disease challenges ripple through the entire supply chain.
Why does this matter? Because the poultry industry is complex, and today’s customers expect partners who speak their language, whether you’re offering a feed additive, a software solution, or simply trying to solve a customer service issue.
What started as Swine Lingo, helping non-swine folks understand farrowing crates and nursery feed phases, has now expanded into Poultry Lingo and will soon be applied to other species, including dairy, beef, and the pet industry. Each version is tailored to help teams speak confidently, serve better, and build stronger partnerships—making it a perfect resource for anyone learning how to understand poultry production in a commercial context.
When sales, marketing, and customer support teams understand the language of poultry production and poultry terminology, something powerful happens; they become trusted partners, not just vendors.
Producers and technical teams can tell when someone truly understands their challenges, as opposed to reading from a script. Speaking poultry fluently builds instant credibility. It shows respect for your customers’ world, their animals, barns/houses, and bottom lines. Instead of generic pitches, your teams can engage in real conversations about improving flock health, optimizing feed strategies, or managing seasonal production pressures.
With a grasp of poultry production systems, your teams won’t just talk; they’ll listen better. They’ll know how to ask the questions that uncover customer pain points:
More thoughtful questions lead to more meaningful solutions.
Too often, sales and marketing focus on product features instead of production realities. Poultry Lingo helps bridge that gap. Your teams will learn how to connect your solutions, whether it may be from feed additives, sensors, or services, to the real-world challenges poultry producers face every day. Instead of simply pitching a product, they’ll explain how it can:
Stronger relationships. Better conversations. And ultimately, solutions that help your customers—and your business—thrive.
If there’s one thing Dr. Bradley’s career has proven, it’s this: no one ever stops learning in animal agriculture. What began 15 years ago with a rookie mistake in poultry research has grown into a lifelong pursuit of understanding this dynamic industry.
Today, she continues to learn alongside her team of experts: nutritionists, production specialists, welfare advocates, immunologists, and veterinarians. Together, they are shaping Poultry Lingo to be a hybrid resource that evolves with the industry and helps more people contribute meaningfully to it.
Dr. Bradley’s journey has taken her from confused conversations about battery cages and layer genetics to training poultry producers, speaking at industry conferences, and consulting on farms across the country. And the learning continues—this summer, she’ll take the stage as a global speaker, presenting on enzymes and poultry nutrition in Bangladesh, sharing insights and learning from poultry leaders around the world.
Poultry Lingo is not the end of the learning journey; it’s the starting point for anyone who wants to master poultry terminology, connect the barn and the boardroom, ask better questions, and build a more resilient animal agriculture industry.
Important DatesLaunch Day: Wednesday, September 3rd, 2025
Last Day to Sign Up: Tuesday, September 2nd, 2025