How much do six adult hens eat?

CHICKEN CRAZY1

Crowing
7 Years
Nov 6, 2012
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In the coop talking to my chickens.
How much do six adult heavy egg-layers eat? We are getting five chicksn and I am trying to persuade certain members of the family that one extra chicken is not going to eat much! We already have twenty-six,who go through a bag of feed in about a month or so,and we finally pushed to get five chicks this spring. Can anyone answer my question?
 
Not math! Any idea how many cups are in a pound? (I can figure out the rest. Math is not my thing.)
From my post a while ago, one of my hens eat 6.667 labs of organic pellets/month. I free range them at least 8 full days out of the month, eating mostly grass and bugs. I feed them a handful of steel cut oats 8 time/month.
 
Not math! Any idea how many cups are in a pound? (I can figure out the rest. Math is not my thing.)
You will have to get a scale and measure out how many cups in a pound...it varies because of the size of the feed etc. I figure one of my hens eats around 4.12 pounds of food a month. 5-6 hours of free ranging a day and kitchen scraps every night and a handful of scratch every morning. As you can see, it varies with how much they get out/what other things they get to eat.
 
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Ok...am I over feeding?
Roughly, my girls are eating 2-2.5lbs each a week...plus treats.
Everyone is laying. They always act like it's a feeding frenzy...which I think has more to do with them being excited that I'm feeding them.
 
I have a huge feed container that I always leave full. I guess maybe I need to hang it since the chickens like to scratch the feed out on the ground. They basically eat on demand and I have never had a problem. I also throw out birdseed and will treat them here and there with mealworms and hamburger meat. Oh and they love corn on the cob.
 
The typical recommendation is 4-6oz per bird per day. That works out to 1lb12oz-2lbs10oz per bird per week. This is of course going to vary based on season, laying vs not, bantams vs large fowl, free ranging, treats, etc.
 

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