Feed brands, feed types

The only place really close to me sells something called K (for Kruse I think) 17% Lay mash by Western Milling LLC (Goshen, CA). The girls eat it just fine, but I keep hearing about different brands and have to wonder. Also, they started out on chick starter, and now at 21 weeks are on this Kruse mash. Are there better brands out there? Does it matter? Also, what exactly is the difference between mash, crumbles, and pellet? I can guess, but from some of the posts I've read, I might be wrong. I would REALLY appreciate some help here. Thanks.

PS: I sincerely apologize if this information is located elsewhere in the forum and this creates redundant answers....I did search and read whatever sounded helpful but not all questions were answered.

I feed mash, pellets on rare occasion and crumbles on even rarer occasion.

Feed is feed. The content is often identical, if made by the same company. The shape or texture is not an indicator of quality or anything else. All feed is ground into a mash. Then, at some expense, the feed is pelletized. The customer pays for that pelletizing. It does make a convenient food product.

Crumbles are often just pellets that get broken, intentionally.

So it does not matter what the texture is. However... and for me? This is huge. Mash can be made by local mills who do not have technical machines to pelletize. Thus, local grown mash is often far, far cheaper, per pound. To me, that's great.
People often object to mash because they think it is dusty and wasteful. It need not be. It only looks dusty because of all the flour on the product. Add a little vegetable oil as a dressing and stir? It pretty much looks like crumbles. Add a little water and stir? It looks pretty much like crumbles.

This damp, porridge cannot be put in a self feeder, but for trough feeding? In our experience, the birds love it. It ferments well too, if you use that system. That we often save 40% on the cost of 100lb of feed? Well worth it. One last benefit. Mash is often freshly ground. Sometimes, bagged pellets or crumbles have a date stamp of 4 or 5 months old. Don't like feed that old. Hope that helps.

hmmm here in israel i had the same problem; we had the mash, but they would only pick out the good things and always had a lot of 'dust' left over; so i started stirring the dust in with warm water, and they would rush to eat that; in afternoon, when i came home for a break, i would put donw their regular feed... til they go to perches... now we got some fine crumble type feed, but it also has the same dust leftovers. sometimes i dump the 'dust' in with leftovers from our kitchen, like a salad with croutons...