Question I have never really seen on here. How gently do the eggs need to be handled? When I candle I try to do it as fast as possible so that they will not get cold. Will the jostling them around make them die or burst the veins? Or can they take a pretty hard drop or shake?
A hen will roll them around but they're laying on soft nesting material so don't get dropped, shaken or bumped.
Except for when 2 or more hens are competitive brooding and steal each others eggs when they get up for their daily stretch.
I am glad to see the information sharing about general flock keeping as well as hatching here. Most of us read lots of things, and eventually discover conflicting information. When all else fails, your flock will tell you whether you need to change something.
As a general rule, as others have said, I do not feed layer. I feed a grower or all-flock/general poultry feed, and offer free choice grit and oyster shell, always available. I also give plain homemade yogurt, apples, meal worms, etc. as treats, and all my birds right now are getting a treat dish of scratch (DH calls it crack LOL) right before bedtime. I mix my own scratch. I mix cracked corn, whole wheat, rolled oats, wild bird seed, and whatever else is on sale or sounds good at the time I'm buying ingredients. Commercial scratch almost always has a ton of milo which my birds just don't eat that much of, and it is a waste. I hate waste.
When I am fermenting I mix all-flock/general poultry feed with my scratch mix. Here, for me, right now, FF doesn't work, but once spring is here I'll start fermenting again. I had to be out of town several weeks in a row 2-5 days at a time starting in October, and I do not expect DH to maintain FF, nor does he especially wish to, so I switched all to free choice dry plus treats. For several weeks I used Nutrena All-Flock and Starter/Grower, and my flock seemed to be on the decline, so I switched back to locally ground starter and grower and a Ranchway Poultry Feed for the adults, continuing treats and of course grit and oyster shell. When I read about the recall due to low calcium in Nutrena feeds, I upped yogurt, and figured I knew at least part of the problem.
Amen on the conflicting information. I know a lot of people that get their feeding and poultry health advice from the feed store. Not a good idea. No offense to feed store employees that may know what they're talking about but I don't know any that went to vet school or studied poultry nutrition.
I mix my own scratch too. Scratch from the feed store is a mix of grains with no guaranteed analysis or ratios. They usually just include the cheaper grains in larger quantities.
Hey, I can do that at home. Additionally, the scratch should be adjusted seasonally. In summer, I give almost exclusively oats which is lower in energy but a little higher in protein. In winter, wheat, barley and sunflower seed. In mild weather it doesn't matter as much. By excluding corn, I avoid GMOs. I buy the grains and seeds in 50 pound bags. I have recently started sprouting all their scratch. The current mix of sprouts is wheat, sunflower seed, winter peas, buckwheat and flaxseed, in that order.
I also started fermenting feed. I was going to just try it on one flock but the more I learned about it, I've started feeding all of them FF. They all still have free choice dry bulk feeders in the coops. I kick myself for not keeping better records but I'm going through noticeably less feed now.
I'm looking forward to a large enough hatch to try a little experiment. I'm going to split the chicks into two groups. Feed one dry and one fermented and compare growth rates.
All the eggs are from 2 different flocks so 2 different roosters so I'll have to include equal numbers in the two test groups.
Oh yeah
good one. I do the oyster and egg shell as well, but I find I have to crush it up really well or they get stopped up, but how much is too much ?
Actually the larger particle size is better for active layers. They stay in the upper digestive tract longer so make contact with calcium absorption sites in the intestine while the birds are on the roost sleeping, not eating but often that's when the egg is in the shell gland.
As I'm reading through the post tonight, trying to catch up since dinner (50+ post), I am learning a lot of things about feeding my chickens. This of course leads me to a question: "Aren't oyster shells a source of calcium?" or is that something that I need to offer also?
Oyster shells are an excellent source of calcium, research shows likely superior to all others. That's the reason to provide oyster shell for laying hens.
Have any of you ever fed alfalfa pellets to chickens? I feed it to my sheep and horses instead of grain usually and the chickens glean it from the ground where they spill it. I was wondering if it was OK to feed it to them in a larger quantity, i.e. like cutting the layer pellet half with the alfalfa pellets?
I tried it once but the chickens ignored it.
I plant alfalfa in their pastures though.
I have been debating on that Ron. My brinseas have the cooling option too but I've been scared to try it! Do you use it every hatch?
Is the cooling option adjustable or is it set at 2 hours or not at all?
When I weigh eggs, I turn the heat off and take my time. I think that simulates the hen off the nest.
If you think about it, a hen usually has a higher hatch rate than incubators. Also, they evolved to have a daily cooling period.
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