best brand of chicken feed?

[MeepBeep]

IMO 'The Best Feed" is really almost all personal preference and opinion for most...

I have always been of the opinion that man created 'balanced diet all purpose feed' is never a total replacement for a varied diet...

Now don't get me wrong, lots of scientific study has went into discovering what each animal needs and most commercial feed is tailored to those studies and no doubt animals can survive and even sometimes thrive on many of the commercial feeds as their sole ration, but most will agree if you really want the birds to thrive it's generally best to add something more...

For that reason for me the cheapest and closest proximity commercial 18% or greater (non-layer) commercial pelleted poultry feed is the BEST I supplement heavily with an ever changing daily offering of fresh produce (and sometimes scratch) that is dusted with a fermented yeast/grain feed additive, to me this provides the best of both worlds as they have a never ending supply of a higher protein 'core' diet from the pellets and they get the varied diet by the supplemented foods... And this doesn't break my pocket book as the fresh produce I get is pulled from the shelf 'imperfect' or 'day old' from a few local ma/pa grocery stores for free...

 

[LeslieDJoyce]

Buckeye feed looks good, I lookbed up places near me, one is closed down.  The other only sells for horses.  I'll have to call the one left.
They do have several different layer feeds, one is 20% and has porcine meal and animal fat in it.  I think that's good.  Which brings me to the question, Why did chicken feed go all vegetarian?  Was it because of meat or chicken by products like feathers?

I am surprised that a commercial feed for chickens actually gives you a choice of a few different layer diets.  

I have searched a zillion ways to evict corn from my chook's diets.  But then you're left with the evil soybeans.  I've come to realize that the most important nutrient for a chicken is calories.  And that comes from corn.  

From what I've read, industrial chicken feed went all vegetarian because industrial farms recycle poultry litter as feed for other animals ... and when doing so regulations require that no animal parts be in the feed. Add in some clever marketing, and you end up with people thinking vegetarian feed is better for the chickens.

http://extension.missouri.edu/p/G2077

There is a great old book on poultry nutrition called "Feeding Poultry" that says birds getting soy as their primary protein source do better if a little animal protein is added in. The book describes lots of ways to accomplish that, and one simple way is to offer the birds milk as a beverage. Makes me want a cow.

You can read "Feeding Poultry" for free at the link below. There are also reprints available at Amazon.

http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=coo.31924003011545;view=1up;seq=11

I've read reports that whey can make the birds gassy ... and whey is expensive. I'm still researching dairy for poultry cuz I like the idea.

There is so much fraud in the Organics end of the industry that I don't feel comfortable paying extra for that. I think I found one organic feed manufacturer that independently tests every delivery to make sure it really is organic, the others rely on certification which is easy to falsify. Makes me really sad, because I'd love to avoid the pesticides.

Another thing to consider with soy protein concentrates is where it is manufactured. I've read reports of so-called soy protein concentrate not testing anywhere near the label claims for protein content ... seems to be most problematic with the imported stuff. Researching some countries' soy farming practices might make you really depressed.

Similar stuff can be said for other plant-based biproduct-type protein concentrates. Canola. Cottonseed. Camelina. Aggressive breeding, farming, processing and marketing of the waste from the primary product as animal feed makes me nervous. Just looking into who sponsors the research as something new entering the animal feed food chain ...

I agree, corn seems to be a fine nutrient for poultry. But some popular food writing has done well to demonize corn and now some food shoppers are looking for animal products from animals not fed corn. As far as I know, there are no Pastured eggs on grocery store shelves that are also corn-free, soy-free, Canola-free, GMO-free -- the important buzz-words for some people. Customers looking for all of that seem to be turning to backyard/barnyard eggs. But we don't always have as much control of our poultry feed as we would like.

Finding GMO free corn is tricky. I've been told corn grown in the USA for export is more likely to be GMO free, so most farmers growing corn in Washington state are growing non-GMO varieties. Other countries DO test our shipments. But I've heard about loads of imposter corn being sold within the USA ... the extra money makes that tempting and our lack of testing makes it possible.

 

[Michael Apple]

From what I've read, industrial chicken feed went all vegetarian because industrial farms recycle poultry litter as feed for other animals ... and when doing so regulations require that no animal parts be in the feed. Add in some clever marketing, and you end up with people thinking vegetarian feed is better for the chickens.

There is a great old book on poultry nutrition called "Feeding Poultry" that says birds getting soy as their primary protein source do better if a little animal protein is added in. The book describes lots of ways to accomplish that, and one simple way is to offer the birds milk as a beverage. Makes me want a cow.

When I consider the amount of junk marketed to dog owners, I am thankful animal proteins are not common in poultry feeds. I would prefer to choose which animal protein I use, and know the source of that animal protein.

For high quality whey without any artificial ingredients, it is not overly expensive to the backyard flock owner who has a dozen hens and a rooster. $20-25 should last about a year. Consider that versus the cost of a 50# sack of high quality feed. I've seen many posts on the forum, obsessive about additional protein. Where a balance of the most digestible animal and plant proteins, with a good amino acid profile, are the most beneficial to chickens, 16% is the standard benefit for mature layers. 18% is helpful during moult. Professor Heuser covers most of that in that book you mentioned.

 

[LeslieDJoyce]

For high quality whey without any artificial ingredients, it is not overly expensive to the backyard flock owner who has a dozen hens and a rooster. $20-25 should last about a year. Consider that versus the cost of a 50# sack of high quality feed. I've seen many posts on the forum, obsessive about additional protein. Where a balance of the most digestible animal and plant proteins, with a good amino acid profile, are the most beneficial to chickens, 16% is the standard benefit for mature layers. 18% is helpful during moult. Professor Heuser covers most of that in that book you mentioned.

I'm not sure "obsessing" is the best word for discussing various protein sources in poultry feeds. But I sure have invested a good chunk of time looking into it because I knew nothing about it before a few years ago. I imagine lots of people here are in a similar position.

If we're talking chickens ... Breeders do better with more protein than the standard for layers. Younger birds do better with more protein than the standard for layers. Meat birds do better on more protein than the standard for layers. Even layers perform better with more protein than the 16% standard for layers. But 16% seems to be the standard because that's where the cost/benefit assessments pencil out economically. Drop too much below 16% and both health and performance drop pretty quickly -- which means being extremely careful about treats (hahahaha!) if the birds are on a 16% ration. If we're talking ducks ... mature ducks don't do well on too much protein. And so on.

Of course not all of that is due to the flat percentage of the protein, but has everything to do with the nutritional profile of the protein. And only some of that nutrition can be substituted with added amino acid and vitamin supplements. The same is true for sunshine, which cannot really be replaced with vitamins & supplements. That's before we even look into the manufacturing of vitamins & supplements ...

From what I remember about the Heuser book ... the research about best protein levels for health & performance of adult chickens trickled out at about 22-23% (???, I'd have to double check, but those numbers stick in my brain) ... with improvements shown up to those levels, but not deemed worth the extra expense (even back then, protein was a more expensive ingredient). It is important to note that much of Poultry Science is actually Economics, so finding info on feeding birds for maximum health (instead of maximum profit) is trickier than I had imagined.

And of course different breeds perform differently on different levels of protein. The Livestock Conservancy recommends somewhat higher protein than the standard for heritage breeds, particularly in the earlier stages of life ...

http://www.livestockconservancy.org/index.php/heritage/internal/heritage-chicken-faq

With that in mind, I've also done research into "how much protein is too much" because there is a concern about gout, etc. The best research I found about that indicated high-protein diets alone did not seem to cause kidney damage, but diets high in calcium or high in both calcium and protein did. Doing a quick google, I think this is the research that did a good job studying that (I believe I found the entire article available for free somewhere):

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16359121

I think this is all relevant to people who fall somewhere between backyard flocks (where all the birds are all female, are all approximately the same age, and all are kept like pets), and industrial farms. I call it "barnyard chickens," and those flocks are likely to include more than one species of bird, include both genders of birds, include birds of various ages at any given time, might possibly include some breeders, and can have flock sizes of a couple dozen birds up to a couple hundred in each flock, with multiple-flock breeding operations still falling well below what I'd call "industrial." These are not just dual-purpose flocks, but multi-purpose flocks. It can be tricky to manage feed in these situations.

I agree ... feeding a few hens isn't going to bust the budget even if you feed them the most expensive stuff. But knowing what is in the feed can still be a huge challenge, so if a person cares about that, they'll have to do some "obsessing."

 

[Michael Apple]

I agree ... feeding a few hens isn't going to bust the budget even if you feed them the most expensive stuff. But knowing what is in the feed can still be a huge challenge, so if a person cares about that, they'll have to do some "obsessing."

That word bothered you, eh? There's no need to see it as a personal attack. What I mean are those posts trivializing concerns about protein percentages, when it is a balance of the most digestible proteins, both animal and plant, that show the best results over many years of trials. Protein sources come with additional nutrients, some good and some bad. In excess, protein can destroy the liver. Even too much of a good thing can upset the balance and cause health problems. Posts about feeding venison, beef, pork seem to revel with use, when studies show those meat products high in fatty acids or phosphoric acid increase the likelihood mortality in a variety of ways. If one were to question a formulator at a mill, and their questions were not answered to their satisfaction, it would be time to move on. I've asked for sources of ingredients before, and when satisfied, used the formulation. It really isn't much of a challenge to avoid lesser quality feed rations, but those books containing factual information about feedstuffs like the one you mentioned are certainly helpful to anyone desiring to learn about poultry nutrition. If one concerns himself more with cutting costs than raising healthy birds, he may want to question why he is raising birds in the first place. I would think most people posting on this forum appreciate these birds and want to raise them for other reasons beyond just being a food source.

 

[Tallstack]

j,ryjrkyjk,ry

 

[Michael Apple]

After a meal of Millet you can see the steam rising off the birds. You can actually over do this. You can literally burn up a bird and kill it with a hot feed. Careful, small amounts like a tea spoon at a time. Feed Millet and Lentils near roost time and this will keep them warm at night. Arguments are welcome

Boone

Be careful. They might burn your house down.

 

[dawg53]

Hot feed...an explanation here in post #8:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/583563/scratch-and-hot-chickens#post_7604430

 

[LeslieDJoyce]

That word bothered you, eh? There's no need to see it as a personal attack.

I wasn't bothered by it at all. I'm not even sure what other threads you were referring to and doubt I've posted in them.

 

[seminolewind]

Quote:
I appreciate all your research and posting what you find. I think anyone involved in this discussion is obsessing over feeding their chickens, and that includes myself and it includes Michael

I love sucking up all the information posted and figuring out what to keep and what to throw out. By-products always make me think of companies that come in at the end of the day and sweep the floor and sell it as by-products. Like when I used to smoke I always pictured those real cheap cigarettes being made from sweepings.

I've come to realize that corn is pretty good as calories. Soy's okay too and I think that's where we get the protein. But there is a real real real most important thing to me is the date on the bag. I've had feed made from 10 days ago, a month ago, and recently 6 MONTHS!. I tossed that. So I do now limit myself to feed stores that have a high turnover of chicken feed. I hate it when crumbles turn to dust and with older feed that's frequent.

And I agree with you, Leslie. I think 16% is the minimum. Manna was 18% and recently went to 15% and much cheaper. I'm glad that chicken keeping has exploded in numbers and at some point these brands are going to have to compete for customers . Purina has recently added probiotics. I just realized from what Chris posted that Hawkeye offers like 4 different kinds of Layer. I don't want to feed the minimums. I want to feed the healthiest. Nobody prints that on the bag. If healthiest is 20% I'll feed that. I would like a bit of meat product in there for protein and nutrients.