Feeding Chickens Pig Feed

chicks for better health

Songster
11 Years
May 4, 2008
452
5
139
West Glenville, NY
I was talking with the owner of my local feed mill yesterday. I asked him what the difference was between layer feed and swine feed, his reply was the main difference was the vitamin pack, and the swine feed is 14% vs the layer that is 16%. Looking at the ingredients it seems that the main differences are


Chicken Feed Swine Feed

Crude Protein 16% 14%

Crude Fat minimum 3% 3%

Crude Fiber max 6% 5%


B-12 B

Vit. K

By using swine feed as chicken feed as well I'd be able to reduce feed costs by $80 per ton, and I would be able to purchase by the ton instead of 50# bag.

What do you all think?

Thanks
 
Where will the calcium come from for the layers? I don't see Lysine in the ingredient list for either feed nor the Fat content, are there any other vitamins and/or minerals?

I think swine feed might do in a pinch while waiting for an order of Chicken/Layer feed to arrive (we must either barge seasonally in large amounts or order often in smaller amounts to come by AIR). But in the long run, if you do not supplement what is missing, somehow, your flock or birds are going to begin showing the "neglect" of the missing ingredients needed but health or egg production will decrease to nothing at some point. One thing that would show immediately would be soft egg shells without calcium.

There should at least be Vitamin A, D, E, B12, Riboflavin, Niacin, Thiamine, Ferrous Sulfate (iron), Zinc and Calcium Supplements (a few not listed such as Magnesium and Folic Acid). I also wonder where/how the protein is provided? Is it fish, mammal, or Plant Protein Product?

I took a Nutrition/Husbandry class and there are recipes that can be followed to make your own feed but you also have to live in an area where you can obtain the ingredients while the amounts are in such a large quantity, it would seem easier to have a mill mix/create the feed for a person's needs/wants. Also, I often wonder and try to learn how feeding/feeds were provided or obtained in the old days and how short the lifespan was...in regard to today's feeds and cost, it is more cost effective to order or buy in large quantity but then you have to figure in the loss of value in length of storage and how the storage will be done with the least amount of damage/mold, loss of nutrient value.

(One interesting thing in the Nutrition class we learned was the nutrient value of a commercial bag of dog feed decreased very fast in a 30-50 pound bag of dog feed because uninformed dog owners usually only have one dog to feed and leave the bag open. Leaving that bag open to the air decreased the nutrients long before the bag was empty and this happened throughout the life of the dog...bag after bag.)

(Remembered to add:)
Another thing we learned in class was if you do order and store in large quantity, its wise to take a bag of feed every so often and open it, reach down into the middle of the bag and scoop a portion out to have the nutrient value analyzed---see above paragraph---to ensure your feed is still worth feeding and hasn't lost the nutrient value. In effect, you pay for one thing and in the end may not end up with what you paid for.
 
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I showed the main differences only

here are all the ingredients

Grain Products, Processed Grain by products, plant protein product, molasses products, dicalcium phosphate, monocalcium phosphate, potassium sulfate, magnesium sulfate, magnesium oxcide, calcium carbonate, calcium sulfate. Dolomitic limestone, salt, ferrous sulfate, zinc sulfate, zinc oxide, manganous sulfate, manganous oxide, cooper sulfate, calcium Iodate, Ethylenediamine, Dihydriodide, cobalt carbonite, sodium selenite, vitamin A Palmitate, Vitamin D3 supplement, vitamin B supplement



I don't see riboflavin, Niacin, THiamine, or folic acid, or vitamin K in the ingredients. It is very possible that I could have the mill add these vitamin supplements.


Are the missing ingredients needed? Is there other things we could provide? What about a vitamin pack that is added in water?
 
I asked my delivery guy that once and his reply was "it depends on what the swine feed is". Meaning, some operations have some odd concoctions at certain times of a hog's life. Feed for a gilt may be completely different than that of a sow. But I guess as long as the feed guy knows that going into the venture....
 
Quote:
Why is there Cobalt in a pig feed? Hmmmm

The Riboflavin, niacin, Thiamine, and Folic Acid are probably in the "vitamin B supplement".

Growing pigs don't require folic acid or thiamine.

The Vitamin K would probably be listed as "Menadione Bisulfite" on the ingredient listing
 
My chick feed is actually swine show feed. It's a 21% corn mash without calcium. Then my mill has a layer mash that is a 14% corn mash with calcium. I don't know the minerals in each as I don't have a feed tag in front of me. My chicks do great on it.
 
There quit a bit different between the two. Higher salt in the swine feed, lower level of calcium, no Methionine in swine, the added selenium in swine feed.


Poultry- Swine-

Crude Protein, Minimum 18.00% Protein, Minimum 18.00%
Lysine, Minimum 0.89% Lysine, Minimum 1.05%
Methionine, Minimum 0.37% --------------------------------
Crude Fat, Minimum 3.50% Fat, Minimum 3.00%
Crude Fiber, Maximum 4.50% Fiber, Minimum 4.00%
Calcium (Ca), Minimum 3.00% Calcium (Ca), Maximum .60%
Calcium (Ca), Maximum 4.00% Calcium (Ca), Minimum 1.10%
Phosphorus (P), Minimum 0.55% Phosphorus (P), Minimum .60%
Salt (NaCl), Minimum 0.10% Salt (NaCl), Minimum .20%
Salt (NaCl), Maximum 0.60% Salt (NaCl), Maximum .70%
------------------------------------ Selenium (Se), Minimum 0.3 ppm
------------------------------------ Zinc (Zn), Minimum 400 ppm
----------------------------------- Chromium, Minimum 0.2 ppm

Here is another swine feed-
Crude Protein, min 18.0%
Lysine, min 1.15%
Crude Fat, min 6.0%
Crude Fiber, max 5.0%
Calcium (Ca), min 0.8%
Calcium (Ca), max 1.3%
Phosphorus (P), min 0.8%
Salt (NaCl), min 0.3%
Salt (NaCl), max 0.8%
Chromium (Cr), min 200 ppb
Selenium (Se), min 0.3 ppm
Zinc (Zn), min 200 ppm
Vitamin A, min 5,820 IU/lb
Vitamin D3, min 770 IU/lb
Vitamin E, min 33 IU/lb
Menadione, min 2.2 mg/lb
Riboflavin, min 4.6 mg/lb
Niacin, min 28 mg/lb
d-Pantothenic Acid, min 26 mg/lb
Vitamin B12, min 0.018 mg/lb
Biotin, min 0.18 mg/lb

Chris
 
If you free-range, in summertime at least the chooks should be able to make up for the protein difference via bugs they will eat. You can supplement that with beans too Regarding calcium, recycling the egg shells to their feed will handle that, and in warmer weather they will get more than you might think from greens. If a choice is to be had, I would always say pellets because they will keep their nutrition longer due to it being harder for oxygen to penetrate into the pellet's interior whereas oxygen can easily saturate crumbles and make them go stale sooner. I keep no less than 6 months feed on hand due to the dire state of the economy and not trusting in the ability to buy it whenever I want to in the future.
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we live next to a feed store that makes their own also, and same thing, the only difference between their hog and layer is that they add calcium to the layer. that is the only difference on this one. the hog comes in 13, 16 and 20 percent with the price difference being 1.50 from the 16 to the 20 percent.

Our feed store offers a flock block. that's what it's called. it's $10. maybe if you're using the hog feed you can use a flock block if you can find them? then you would have the extra vitamins and calcium and they way the block lasts a long time.

that is what a friend of mine and myself does. we save a lot of money ont he chicken feed by using the hog feed, and just keep a block out (you can cut them into smaller sizes and split between pens.)
 

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