At what point do you give up on pellets?

[dianaross77]

My girls won't eat them. They dug through the contents of a 7lbs feeder to find the crumbled pellets and threw the whole pellets on the ground. I haven't gotten any eggs in 2 days and for the last week I've only gotten 2 a day. Before that, even in the heat wave I was getting 4 eggs a day from 4 hens. I can see they've all lost weight. I was trying to be a harda** and stand my ground. They didn't get scratch so they would be hungry. I've held the pellets in my hand like threats, they just bill them out onto the floor. I crumbled up a little in my hands, they dug through it to get to the crumbles and left the pellets. I am not a softie. These girls aren't pets, they're here to make eggs. I only wanted to switch them to pellets because they make such a mess with the crumbles and waste so much. I can put up with getting no eggs for a little while while they get the hang of the pellets. But I'm worried they're just dumb enough to starve themselves to death.

 

[LarryPQ]

Stop filling the feeder--they'll clean up the mess.

They may be losing weight due to the heat.

 

[teach1rusl]

Well...I don't see them going on a hunger strike to protest, but I'd cave myself, as my girls are pets. You could stick a bunch in the blender (the pellets - not the chickens

). At least that way you're not wasting.
As far as wasting crumbles, just put the feeder up for day and make them clean the floor/ground before putting the feeder back out. Or put a large tray (BIG planter base may work) under your feeder. That way it saves spillage.

 

[madamwlf]

My girls did the same thing. I gave up and went back to crumbles. I can't have them wasting food and feeding the rodents. Plus egg production went down too. Can't have that either.

 

[kidcody]

When I first switched to pellets my girls wouldn't eat them either!

I bought a off brand bag of pellets thinking chicken food is chicken food. Well I found out that's not correct! They will eat the pellets if it is a Purina brand!

Are you feeding Purina?

 

[jtbrown]

You could stick a bunch in the blender (the pellets - not the chickens ).

Okay, all that aside, I was thinking of switching to pellets, not gonna do it.​

 

[yinepu]

I have some that refuse the pellets.. and some that hate the crumbles.. so I feed both.. they still make a mess regardless..so I am going to switch to a PVC feeder.. from what I have read they are pretty much a 0 waste kind of feeder

 

[dianaross77]

The pellets that I got are Armada brand. It is a local feed company. They smell good, like bread. The purina flock raiser smells gross to me.

I made a pvc feeder but had to take it down because it got soaked in the rain. I just put a new "lid" on the run and it's nice and dry so I guess I'll go out and put it back up. I just really think these chickens are idiots! I have switched grown ducks and ducklings over to pellets with no problem at all. But I do wonder if that's because the duck pellets I get from the same company have pork products in them. Maybe they taste better. I'm going to go out with a handful of duck pellets and see if they like those. If they do maybe they'll decide to give the layer pellets a try.

 

[Auscal]

Maybe try wetting some of the crumbles, to make a type of porridgy mash. This may help them to adjust to the "new flavour" Maybe after a few days, they will find the pellets more palatable.

 

[dianaross77]

Good news! I went out and put the pvc feeder back up. It's a 4" vertical pipe with a sewer clean out on the top as a lid and a plastic rabbit litter pan (for a corner) on the bottom. Being able to see the individual pellets and break them into pieces helped a lot. When I left the run they were all eating. And the litter pan is deep enough to keep them from billing the food out.