What good ideas, Fuzzy. I'm a big proponent of Vit C. I use a mix of C/cod liver oil/probios and Vit E whenever Maggie the goat gets a UTI. It works wonders. I also use Manna Pro for the goats' minerals and it's really good stuff. I know what you mean about losing one. We are going on 2 years and so far I've only lost 2 to disease and 2 to predators out of 28 birds so I feel pretty good. I give them a mix of the game bird feed and egg/layer pellets plus any and all greens I have in the kitchen that's a bit old plus cabbages to play tetherball with - lol. I took Nova's idea of putting down leaves and letting them dig through them and they love it. Gives them something to do.I have been doing some reading on vitamin c, seems though birds produce their own and usually don't need it, but can benefit in hot or cold extremes.
I knew about the hot weather and usually toss in tomatoes from the garden. I didn't know about the cold though! So after some reading i found that a lot of dark leafy greens have C and calcium too, so i tossed in some baby spinach yesterday in preparation for today's cold snap. Today they didn't even hesitate when i tossed them, bee lined!
Also by default (i was a second too late to get the last bag of oyster shell) i am trying out the manna pro omega supplement. Girls don't seem to know what to think of the crumble, but are trying it out. I'm keeping it in a separate dish right now tossed in with the grit. When i get some oyster shell i want to put those in the same dish so they know what it's supposed to be! LOL. It's pricey at $12 a 5# bag, but says that it can be mixed in 50# of feed. If i can find some kent blue seal crumble for adult birds, i may.
When i get down to only 4-6 birds i'll probably just start making my own mix for them with the manna pro omega+calcium supplement, plus the showbird conditioning pellets, (they can be mixed 50/50 with scratch and scratch grains/ ground horse feed from the mill with the molasses.......Will be expensive but i really want pets and i'm so heart sick when i lose one. I've yet to keep one past 2 - 2 1/2 years, and according to the poultry health handbook they can live up to 15.
