Du-mor or don't du-mor

[chickenenthusiasts5698]

I know i’m a bit late late but I feed Purina layena+omega 3s. It’s the best feed i’ve fed so far.

 

[Mossy Dell]

I do want to know why some people seem to think corn is the greatest and others seem to consider it junk.

I will say a good word for corn. It is a foundation, not a filler, as the most digestible cereal grain. And the only one that supplies vitamin A, I have read. It is high energy, though low protein, at least the usual commodity dent corn. I feed a lot of fermented oats, and corn is a wonderful balance to high-fiber, low-energy oats.

Laying hens do well on heavily corn-based diets as long as there's not only corn or overwhelmingly so. A balance with other grains is always best. Chickens like corn, and it has been proven for centuries for growing fowl, layers, and broilers. I feed at least 20% corn in my grain-based mix, with other energy sources being wheat and milo. A classic scratch mix is corn, wheat, and oats. Unless you limit-feed or balance energy sources, as with using some oats or barley, corn can fatten, primarily non-laying fowl. At the level I feed corn, my fowl are lean. They need it and love it.

 

[Birdielee]

I will say a good word for corn. It is a foundation, not a filler, as the most digestible cereal grain. And the only one that supplies vitamin A, I have read. It is high energy, though low protein, at least the usual commodity dent corn. I feed a lot of fermented oats, and corn is a wonderful balance to high-fiber, low-energy oats.

Laying hens do well on heavily corn-based diets as long as there's not only corn or overwhelmingly so. A balance with other grains is always best. Chickens like corn, and it has been proven for centuries for growing fowl, layers, and broilers. I feed at least 20% corn in my grain-based mix, with other energy sources being wheat and milo. A classic scratch mix is corn, wheat, and oats. Unless you limit-feed or balance energy sources, as with using some oats or barley, corn can fatten, primarily non-laying fowl. At the level I feed corn, my fowl are lean. They need it and love it.

Thank you. I appreciate your input. Sounds useful to me. At this point, my hen got injured and isn't eating much. All she's really willing to eat is sunflower seeds. This morning i hand-cracked some corn grains, hoping she'd eat them because she's lost so much weight. She skipped right over the corn, barley, and oats and picked out all the black sunflower seeds, (shell on.) She gained a little weight, finally. I measured her today. She was dropping weight fast. Maybe you happen to know the downside of a hen living on sunflower seeds and greens she picks? And bugs.

 

[Birdielee]

I know i’m a bit late late but I feed Purina layena+omega 3s. It’s the best feed i’ve fed so far.

I got some of that! Just a few pounds from the bulk bag. I think it's the one that doesn't really want to say what it is? It smells great and the pellets are a little smaller.

 

[Birdielee]

My fish feed isn't popular. With my chickens. They spill way more than they eat. Fermenting it made a strong cheese smell after just a day or two. Gross. Nobody wanted to eat it.
My 2 new hens' digestive health seems to have improved, though. On a combo of layena omega3 and the soy free feed whose name I cannot remember. They don't stink like diarrhea and their poops are much more normal. It took 2 weeks on new feed to see the change.

 

[Mossy Dell]

Thank you. I appreciate your input. Sounds useful to me. At this point, my hen got injured and isn't eating much. All she's really willing to eat is sunflower seeds. This morning i hand-cracked some corn grains, hoping she'd eat them because she's lost so much weight. She skipped right over the corn, barley, and oats and picked out all the black sunflower seeds, (shell on.) She gained a little weight, finally. I measured her today. She was dropping weight fast. Maybe you happen to know the downside of a hen living on sunflower seeds and greens she picks? And bugs.

Sunflower seeds are a fine feed. Hulled, they are high protein and energy. The hulls take both down, to about 17% protein and energy just above oats.

I bet soaked oats would appeal to your hen and be good for her. Actually I would try soaking some corn and oats together overnight and offering them to her. Fowl loved soaked grains. They are wild about those that go on to ferment, so I wouldn't worry about leftovers. Just keep grains being soaked or fermented covered with water. I have also known a friend to soak oats in buttermilk and feed that as a superfood tonic to ill fowl or those being conditioned for show.

 

[Mossy Dell]

As I said, cover grain with water. Allow enough water for swelling of grian. And I recall you may have rolled oats. If those are whole oats that have been rolled to crush the hulls, I have fermented them the same as whole oats. What feed folks call rolled oats are not the Quaker steamed and flaked oat bits that people often called rolled. Having said that, such quick oats are great feed mixed with chopped hardboiled eggs.

Soybeans, like corn, are controversial on here. Most are GMO so they can be sprayed with Roundup. I like roasted soybeans/meal, and there's a big farm up the road that sells non-GMO if I want it. Soybeans are used in mashes and pellets for a protein source/protein booster and have even more energy than corn.

 

[Birdielee]

Thank you for the info on the oats. You answered my question before i asked. I never even knew the oats i have are steamed.