I'm Going Broke on Chicken Feed!

[bgelber]

At the moment I have 17 laying hens, they range from good size Black Australorp to Silkies. They go through a fifty pound bag of layer pellets and a fifty pound bag of scratch or corn ( depending on the weather ) in about 3 1/2 to 4 weeks the food is available all day, they free range every day. Now I do see a big difference when it is either too cold or too stormy for them to be let out.

Of course this is all after I fixed it where our goat couldn't get to the food, now she could eat the feeder clean in about an hour

 

[scorpian5]

We grind our own feed with concentrate from the feed mill and our own corn and oats. We grind a 1/2 ton at a time and it is like $65 for the concentrate and lasts a few months.

 

[chickbird]

Quote:
are you grinding this or are you having a feed mill do this, what's in the concentrate and how expensive is the grinder????

 

[scorpian5]

We have a mixer-mill and we grind our own. I use a Kent product most time but the feed store does have a kind they bag themselves. It is around $15 a bag but i have not gotten any for a while

 

[Mrs. Fluffy Puffy]

I free range my chickens and I feed them kitchen scraps and I only feed them twice a-day. I feed them about 2 scoops in the morning and 2 in the afternoon when I lock them up.

 

[silkiechicken]

Quote:
For me that's a lot! I have 10 hens and 3 roos. If I multiply by four that's still only 200# per 3 weeks. 10# per bird/month sounds like a lot.

From: http://www.lionsgrip.com/feedinstruc.html
Use a good laying ration and keep it in front of the birds at all times. Feed is the biggest expense of egg production, running at about 60 percent of total cost. To prevent waste don't fill the hoppers more than one-half full. Commercial poultry rations normally contain enough calcium (3.0 to 3.5 percent) so that oyster shell or other calcium supplements are not needed. No grit is necessary with present-day laying rations. (I think the exception here is if you free range, grit should be available.)

If grain is low-priced, you may want to use it to cut the cost of purchased feed. However, feeding too much grain will make your hens overly fat. When a complete 15 percent protein laying feed is used, do not feed more than one-half pound of grain per 10 hens daily. A 20 to 22 percent protein laying feed can be used with grain fed free-choice in separate feeders or spread on the ground (1 and 1/4 pounds of grain for every 10 hens daily). Supplementing the complete ration with grain is most economical when low cost local grain is available.

If you feed at this rate, it's about 15 pounds per month for 10 hens. So for 40 hens, that would be 60 pounds of feed.

Interesting.... My 50lbs of feed should be lasting me a long time, more than it is. I wonder if I should start rationing them?

Looks like that article is from 1979, so about 30 years dated. More likely than not, it was based off of a 3-4lb adult leghorn which are efficient egg laying machines. In other words, if you are raising something other than a leghorn, like a standard "dual" type bird, figure leghorn feed amounts and so on to be 2x. Plus, if they are not in a temp steady envornment, winter feeding can be 3x if not more than summer feeding.