Anyone NOT feeding commercial pelleted/mash feed to your layers?

[dsc6]

My twice-a-day mix includes wet/moist incredients, thus the limited amount. I will put some out at bedtime and leave it in the henhouse overnight, so they have morning food, since the weather has cooled off.

Per Resolution, again, I bake the eggs shells for 10 minutes or so, cool them off, and crumble them up. Makes them less prone to grow bad bugs outside.

BTW, my birds do free range a large part of each day. That's why I don't leave a dry mix out for them.

Debbie in PA

Still looking for the ideal dry mix, sans corn and soy.

 

[TinyBirds]

I'm looking forward to reading this post. Just thought I'd share what we feed. We have 250 chickens.

7am: sprouted peas (deer peas $10/bag) - I feed these first in the morning when they're hungrier, then the wheat mix after the peas are gone. The peas are easy to sprout - just soak 12 hours and then sit another day or two after draining in stacked plastic bins w/ small holes in bottom of each.

organic whole wheat (from Coyote Creek Organics locally - bought in bulk 1000 lb amounts - comes to equivalent of $12/bag)
I hand-mix in small amounts of:
sunflower seeds (1 scoop per 5 gallon bucket)
garlic and onion (tiny amount - bought from Mountain Rose Herbs in bulk)
kelp meal (tiny amount - bought from Coyote Creek Organics locally)
fertrell organic nutribalancer (very tiny amount - I give 1/2 of what's recommended because feeding too much of some ingredients could be toxic I'm guessing - like salts)

I don't give fish meal any more since I wanted to get rid of the preservatives. I don't think they liked it much anyway, and the peas/wheat give a high-protein mix already.

 

[kduncan51]

Where can I get deer peas?

 

[TinyBirds]

Quote:
We have a pretty cool feed store that orders unique things. You might be able to ask all the feed stores and find one that can special-order any type of feed-peas. The only thing I wouldn't use is planting-peas because usually they're inoculated and not intended for eating. I'm pretty sure they'd eat any garden peas too (leaves and all), but it would be hard to grow enough to feed a large flock, so it's nice to find them at the store too.

 

[ChickensAreSweet]

Quote:
We have a pretty cool feed store that orders unique things. You might be able to ask all the feed stores and find one that can special-order any type of feed-peas. The only thing I wouldn't use is planting-peas because usually they're inoculated and not intended for eating. I'm pretty sure they'd eat any garden peas too (leaves and all), but it would be hard to grow enough to feed a large flock, so it's nice to find them at the store too.

I'm going to have to check into deer peas as well. Can they eat them whole- without sprouting? I currently feed split peas.

Here's some info on peas I found:

http://www.infoharvest.ca/pcd/summaries/part007.html#s2.1

 

[HeritageHens]

I just discovered a feed mill near me!

One thing they have is a layer food that they make or they will custom mill food for you (1/2 ton minimum). Here's what they say about their layer feed:

Introducing a NON-GMO Whole Grain Chicken Feed

We add whole grains (oats, split peas, red clover, wheat, barley, course ground corn, black oiled sun flower seeds) along with fish meal, oyster shell, Fertrell's NutriBalancer for Poultry, and some good smelling molasses.

This combination makes a nice wholesome 16.5% protein mix for your layers to produce very nice eggs, with greater value without the use of GMO products.

They also say:

Our next area that we will phase out is the use of GMO soy bean meal, and replace it with roasted GMO free soy beans, that we grind ourselves as it is added to the rations. Buy doing these simple steps we hope this will be a more complete and wholesome feed source for your animals and the products you consume from them.

What do you think about this blend? For optimal health, should anything else be added - flax seeds, kelp, probiotics, etc?​

 

[ChickensAreSweet]

Quote:
They also say:

Our next area that we will phase out is the use of GMO soy bean meal, and replace it with roasted GMO free soy beans, that we grind ourselves as it is added to the rations. Buy doing these simple steps we hope this will be a more complete and wholesome feed source for your animals and the products you consume from them.

What do you think about this blend? For optimal health, should anything else be added - flax seeds, kelp, probiotics, etc?​

Sounds good except I am against artificial vitamins and fish meal for my own flock. Will they custom mill?

 

[HeritageHens]

I'll post a complete label tomorrow. We went out to the "feed store" today but it's just a small, family operation so there's no fancy store front. They do supply feed to Concentrates so it's a good place.

On the way out there, I saw a sign for "fresh mushrooms." I bought 18.73 pounds of fresh chantrelles! They were #2's so they had them marked at $0.99 a pound (the #1's were only 4.99/lb!). When I asked about buying the whole box, he gave them to me for $0.50 a pound - $8.50 for the batch!

I spent the last 3 hours cleaning them and there was only about 1/2 to 3/4 pound of waste that I had to discard. I now have 2 dehydrators and the oven being used to dry them and have another large batch being air dried with a fan over a screen - and I have some #1's for dinner tomorrow night. I'm just too tired to go out and rustle up the tag right now.

 

[Kassaundra]

I went to my feed store looking for deer peas, and found two differant kinds neither one "deer" and both quite a bit more expensive, $18, and $24

 

[ChickensAreSweet]

Quote:
I pay $11.40 per 25 lb bag of split peas (human grade) at the grocery store in the bulk foods section. I am planning to check for deer peas at the feed store when I run out.