How to save money on chicken feed?

[Wilsons Far]

I'm in SE Michigan. Get Dumor @ TSC for $12.99-$11.99, depending on sales, for 50# layer feed. Local Mill same price, but delivers for $5

 

[Cmyers]

I'm currently paying $15 for a 50 pound bag of purina chicken feed. I'm looking to reduce the cost as much as possible. However, when looking for chicken feed what % of protein would I want? Im looking into possibly buying 100 pound bags Of feed if I can find it at a better price without losing the quality of the feed.

 

[Cmyers]

Thaks for sharing!!

 

[Rod-T]

Spare pumpkins? Slice the pumpkin in half ..let chickens clean it out..alot lbs feed in pumpkins. . Get um free after Halloween

 

[Fintechie]

Why is it costing you so much? How much are you buying at a time? How many and how old are your chickens?

I just checked my math as I went from buying 50ld bags of Purina layer to local grain company's layer in 100lb bags. The cost of producing an egg for me went from .15 cents to just under .10 cents per egg. I was paying $15.50 for a 50 lb bag of Purina and now buy 100lb bags of Ventura layer for $22.32.

So for a dozen eggs is $1.20 plus the box @.22 is $1.44 cost total.

My local TSC (30+ miles away) has only 50lb bag of Purina to sell. The price is $16.49 before tax. what is your local company? is there a website? Thanks.

 

[Zissura Akadata S]

It sounds like a good price because it reproduces so quickly. Just let it multiply to a larger number before you start feeding it to the chickens. I dont know if chickens can eat snails, you might have to google that one.
-Put the duckweed in a seperate container as your fish because the fish will eat it. I grow duckweed and everyday I give some to my chickens and some to my fish. Both eat it up very quickly. If you put 1/4 cup in your fish tank it will be gone in a few minutes.

been trying to find home grown food to add to my chickens' diet, so I have been reading about duckweed but most of the articles are on broilers. Do layer chickens do well with duckweed??? How much shoid I feed?

 

[Fintechie]

Lately, we've been adding soybean residual after extracting soy milk for our own consumption. They're full of protein and fiber. We mix with crumbles, and chickens seem to prefer that over the pure feed.

 

[BDutch]

The pest with cheap food from the feed industry is that it is unhealthy for the chickens and ourselves if we eat lots of eggs. It contains poison from gmo soy and corn. Another big minus for this cheap gmo food is that it contributes to deforestation on a large scale in rainforests.

So my advice to cut down costs is not to buy cheap feed but to let the chickens free range as much as possible and/or give them healthy feed, fresh from you’re garden or the surrounding area like grasses and herbs, and other greens like duck weed. Take a spade and cut out a few clumps of grass if free ranging is too risky. The chickens will love you for it.
And you can offer them healthy kitchen scraps too to cut down the costs (not sweetened, salted, processed or rotten).

My calculation: if I feed them organic feed and half of what they eat is for free my organic eggs are not expensive at all. I don’t mind if the chickens lay less bc there are less proteins in scraps and greens. But I do wonder what the effect is if they eat feed with less proteins. Anyone with answers to that?

 

[AmeliaBedelia]

well for bedding I quit buying anything...I just use raked yard leaves...free and can change out often.

unless you free range or have lots of kitchen scraps, not much you can do about feed costs

You can look into food co-ops or grocery stores. They will sometimes let you have food scraps for animals (wilted lettuce, bruised produce, etc).

 

[Fintechie]

well for bedding I quit buying anything...I just use raked yard leaves...free and can change out often.

unless you free range or have lots of kitchen scraps, not much you can do about feed costs

We do the same - let them dry under the sun first