adding soy meal to commercial feed

[dimitrischri]

hi guys
i just wanted to ask if anyone adds soymeal to their commercial feed to pump up the protain. i keep pheasants and chukars who they need higher protain than chicken. especially the chicks. i feed standard chick feed which has around 21% protain but i have high mortality numbers in my chicks cause of this. as we all know gamebirds need higher protain levels so i want to ask if anyone has a formula to pump up the protain percentage of commercial feed by adding soy meal.
by the way i cant find any commercial gamebird feed in my country.
thanks

 

[cassie]

hi guys
i just wanted to ask if anyone adds soymeal to their commercial feed to pump up the protain. i keep pheasants and chukars who they need higher protain than chicken. especially the chicks. i feed standard chick feed which has around 21% protain but i have high mortality numbers in my chicks cause of this. as we all know gamebirds need higher protain levels so i want to ask if anyone has a formula to pump up the protain percentage of commercial feed by adding soy meal.
by the way i cant find any commercial gamebird feed in my country.
thanks

Why don't you buy game bird feed? Is it not available where you are? Turkey feed, if you can get it, would work too. If nothing else you can contact an agricultural university. I have asked them to formulate and balance rations for me and they have obliged.

 

[dimitrischri]

i live in cyprus. none has gamebird feed and to ask someone to formulate for you. you have to buy a lot. i only got few birds . also if i order online it wouldbe very expensive. thats why i want to formulate myself cause i can get commercial chick feed and soy meal i just need the right ratios.

 

[Urbanduckfarmer]

You can grind fish food pellets into their ration to boost the protein levels. They usually are around 30 percent protein.

 

[crazy4ChickensNducks]

I get catfish pellets and mix that into my chickens feed during molt and winter. The pellets are 32% protein

 

[dimitrischri]

fish pellets are expensive and they need to be grinded if you want to feed chicks like i do i prefer to mix my feed (21%protain) with straight soy meal. does anyone know a good ratio?

 

[centrarchid]

I have upped protein by adding soy meal and corn gluten meals to a mixture of layer pellets. The birds had access to quality free-range forage which likely helped make up for vitamin deficiencies in the feed mixture. The also have free-choice access to oyster shell for calcium needs of laying hens. The rate of admixture was roughly 30% meal.

Opossum really likes the mix and will come out immediately after sundown to eat the stuff. Pellets appear not to be all that tasty, even for chickens,

 

[Percheron chick]

Soybean meal is the way most feed mills manipulate the protein content as it is the most cost effective ingredient.
You just need to do a little math to figure it out. Your feed is 21%, SB meal is 44%.
If you mix 2 parts feed by weight to one part SB meal you end up with a mixture at 28.6%.
(21+21+44=86. 86÷3=28.6)
You will change the nutritional profile of the feed in other areas so investigate the feed changes beyond just the protein boost.

 

[cassie]

i live in cyprus. none has gamebird feed and to ask someone to formulate for you. you have to buy a lot. i only got few birds . also if i order online it wouldbe very expensive. thats why i want to formulate myself cause i can get commercial chick feed and soy meal i just need the right ratios.

I think if you look around you can find books on how to formulate and balance rations for various types of livestock, including poultry. I am sure I have one, but I don't know where I put it. I have written agricultural universities in the past and they have sent me information on balancing a ration. Once I told them what ingredients I wanted to use and they told me how much of each ingredient to use and what I needed to add to balance it. This advice was free.

 

[EggSighted4Life]

hi guys
i just wanted to ask if anyone adds soymeal to their commercial feed to pump up the protain. i keep pheasants and chukars who they need higher protain than chicken. especially the chicks. i feed standard chick feed which has around 21% protain but i have high mortality numbers in my chicks cause of this. as we all know gamebirds need higher protein levels so i want to ask if anyone has a formula to pump up the protein percentage of commercial feed by adding soy meal.
by the way i cant find any commercial gamebird feed in my country.
thanks

Hi there.

I just want to let you know that not all proteins are crated equal.. and in reality it isn't just the protein that matters... but the actual amino acids they contain. For chickens... they require some animal derived amino acids... so adding soy wouldn't help that even though it did up the protein content. These amino acids are often added into our mostly vegetarian formulas here in the US. I'm not sure if adding actual meat is a possibility for you, or even a good idea... but I am here to share and to learn. It'd especially interesting to see the challenge people face in different countries.

Eggs are 34% protein and 64% fat. Meal worms are up there, as are black soldier fly larva, standard maggots from maggot bucket, and red wigglers... if growing protein is a possibility for ya.

Good luck!