Question about chick food

[stone_family3]

Sorry I wasn't clear, Flock raiser is $17 for 50lbs and chick starter is only sold in 5lb bags for $6 a bag. So it is way cheaper to buy the flock raiser. My tractor supply isn't very good so maybe I'll see if I can call in the next county over for a better price.

 

[PtldChick]

Whidbey

That must be because you're out on the island? Both Wilco and Coastal in Oregon carry Flockraiser and it's $17-18. Right now Wilco is having farm days sale (February) and Flockraiser is only $15/bag. There's one in Gig Harbor if you're going to be in that vicinity before the end of the month.

 

[Coveacres]

@ Whitbey

Purina has more fillers? I feed my flock Purina Layena Plus. I was told this was one of the better feeds on the market. Now I'm curious if this is a good feed or not. What do BYC 'ers suggest?

My chicks have been raised on Purina Start and Grow until around week 16-18. Purina is actually having a class on chicken raising in my town on the 21st. I would be interested Being able to ask him about this if it is an issue.

 

[Fred's Hens]

Lots of people start out buying Purina at a local TSC type store, because of the convenience. Everyone has to start somewhere.

Later on, through discovery, they find a feed mill with higher quality feed at much reduced prices. Local feed mills can sometimes save as much as 50%. I know I do. It just takes some exploring and asking around to find where they are.

 

[poultrypalacewhidbey]

I attribute the high feed prices to the fact that the feed stores are all owned by the same co-op (skagit farmers) thats prices are high on everything. their prices at their stores on the mainland are the same. There are a couple of independent feed stores but they dont run enough quantity to be able to have lower prices. I get all my regular feed from the local mill now because it is cheaper, fresher and I can get what i need. It was costing me 18 dollars a bag for feed from skagit farmers with a bulk discount. the co-op feed store is very reluctant to do special orders, which i had to do because they started only carrying crumble for awhile and I got sick of getting moldy and stale food from them. from the mill i pay 11.80 for an equivalent feed to what i was buying previously. Nice fresh feed and no hassle about bulk orders. However going straight to the mill didn't work any better for chick starter because the only stuff they had was milled two moths ago as they had not started milling it for spring yet.

to coveacres- from my discussions with other folks who raise poultry kent and king have a lot less fillers than purina. That said their product is not available where I live so before i found a mill to buy directly from I used to feed purina and/nutrena because that was all the feed stores in my area stocked. since switching to the locally produced feed i have noticed improvements in my birds particularly the large fowl, geese and turkeys. My geese did very poorly on the purina and nutrena feeds even the ones that were supposidly for waterfowl or gamebirds. I have noticed much better fleshing on all my larger breeds since switching away from the big brand feed. Did not seem to make much difference in the bantams though.

 

[Coveacres]

Thanks I will check my feed store to see if they carry either of those. I just bought Purina because the Layena plus had flaxseed and marigold added. We have a locally owned feed store here that is excellent so I hope if they dont have it they will get it. Just FYI I've been paying about $15 per 50lbs. The "plus" is $15 for 40 pound bags.

 

[Apyl]

I'm not sure if it's all Tractor supply's or not but I just bought a 50 pound bag of Chick starter for 50% off and they had a bunch more of them. The price ended up being $8 for 50 pounds.