Amazing, locally grown and milled feed. Or is it?

[Feanor]

Hello, there is a local feed mill that makes a laying feed mash that I absolutely love. It has a very potent fresh and sweet smell, it's almost moist (there is never any dust), you can see tiny bits of grain in it. It looks and smells so much better than dry, dusty pellets that smell like cardboard. And the girls love it. They lay well on it and eat it a little faster than pellets. The only question is, on the label there isn't much ingredients to it but corn and soybean meal. I'm a big fan of simple food labels for people food, but since this is all my chickens eat (other than free range grass/bugs every evening), should they be getting more variety in their feed? Or does the freshness of the product outweigh the lack of variety? I know that what chickens like isn't always what's best for them, but I would certainly rather eat this if I were a chicken than dry dusty crumbles!

 

[Percheron chick]

If your hens lay well, eat it and look healthy, I'd say that's proof that it meets their needs and is complete. We get so used to a bunch of fillers and stuff in our feed that the ingredient list does look inadequate. I'd just make sure they have some nutritious fresh treats to round out the diet.

The only caution I would have is the perceived moisture. Don't want things to mold when the heat and humidity of summer sets in.

 

[pdirt]

If your hens lay well, eat it and look healthy, I'd say that's proof that it meets their needs and is complete. We get so used to a bunch of fillers and stuff in our feed that the ingredient list does look inadequate. I'd just make sure they have some nutritious fresh treats to round out the diet.

The only caution I would have is the perceived moisture. Don't want things to mold when the heat and humidity of summer sets in.

2x what Percheron chick said. I take it that it's humid in MS in summer...yeah, I'd ask about the moisture part. Either it's actually water moisture or perhaps they used some sort of oil in the "premix" that helps bind the premix to the grainsPossibly because it's a small batch of rather custom-mixed feed, they don't have to adhere to as strict labeling requirements. Ask what is meant by "mineral and vitamin premix", I bet then the list of ingredients won't look so simple. Not that it's a bad thing.

We first started with a very cheap national brand of feed with a "use by date" on it. Now the feed we get rather has a "milled on date", the difference in smell of freshness is no comparison. Sometimes the latter brand of feed we've gotten was milled only a week before, but I bet the stuff you're getting might even be fresher.

 

[Lazy J Farms Feed & Hay]

Technically that feed tag is illegal since it does not list the specific mineral and vitamin components.

This type of feed fits what I expect from a local mill, it is just feed, nothing special. There are no specialty ingredients that might help your flocks health and productivity.

Like PercheronChick said, if it works for you, then continue feeding it. Were it my choice though I'd look for a better feed.

Jim

 

[Feanor]

I guess "almost moist" isn't the best way to describe it; I'm so used to other mashes that are so powdery dry that a billow of dust comes up when I pour them into the feeders. This feed is I guess "not arid and powdery" it reminds me of the goat crunch I get for the goats; maybe a tiny bit of oil or molasses or just good quality mill that doesn't produce so much powder. You can clearly see the cracked corn and then little chunks of I guess the soybean meal and tiny grains of minerals. I figure this is basically what goes into crumbles or mash, before the grind-it-to-powder, press-it-into-pellets, and break-the-pellets-into-crumbles phases.