Attempting Fermenting

[rosemarythyme]

Dampening the food worked. The crumbled break apart and become like a dough and they are going nuts at it. The volume increases quite a bit as well, but now it doesn't want to go down the gravity container part. I Found these hanging troughs that look like they would be ideal.

As you've noted you can't do wet or fermented feed in a gravity feeder. It has to be in some sort of more open container.

I use ceramic cat food bowls (pink bowl on bricks below), small pie plates, ramekins. Anything that's easy to clean and with some weight so they don't easily get knocked over. I don't have an issue with chicks trying to walk in it so "mess" isn't really a problem, and I don't have waste issues as I only put out enough FF to last them the morning and any FF thrown about the chickens will clean up during the day.

For the rest of the day they have a dry gravity feeder as well and any dust/powder left over from that can be made into wet feed, so that entirely eliminates waste.

I don't do a long or complicated fermentation. It's just feed and "enough water" in a single jar and I can keep it going like that for months.

Newly added feed and water:

24 hours later I start serving:

 

[LyleVertigo]

As you've noted you can't do wet or fermented feed in a gravity feeder. It has to be in some sort of more open container.

I use ceramic cat food bowls (pink bowl on bricks below), small pie plates, ramekins. Anything that's easy to clean and with some weight so they don't easily get knocked over. I don't have an issue with chicks trying to walk in it so "mess" isn't really a problem, and I don't have waste issues as I only put out enough FF to last them the morning and any FF thrown about the chickens will clean up during the day. View attachment 4142531

For the rest of the day they have a dry gravity feeder as well and any dust/powder left over from that can be made into wet feed, so that entirely eliminates waste.

I don't do a long or complicated fermentation. It's just feed and "enough water" in a single jar and I can keep it going like that for months.

Newly added feed and water:
View attachment 4142533

24 hours later I start serving:
View attachment 4142532

This is after changing out their bedding and after their evening meal. Much cleaner and no wasted food on the ground. They are also much more satisfied, crashing out right afterwards.

 

[Mother of Chaos]

This is after changing out their bedding and after their evening meal. Much cleaner and no wasted food on the ground. They are also much more satisfied, crashing out right afterwards.

Reminds me of post-Thanksgiving!

The best compliment you can get is a roomful of unconscious people (or chicks.)

 

[LyleVertigo]

The Trough works pretty good! I had to adjust it a few times to where it was too high for them to put their foot in and scratch but low enough to eat. Sometimes one will jump in it but they don't make a mess.

 

[ODY GIRL]

Agree with nuthatched and Altairsky. The question for whether to ferment is driven by feed form. Use fermentation if you have a whole-grain formulation (goes by various terms.) If the feed is in pellet, mini-pellet, or crumble form, just dampen it, which will help the bits stick together. Example of what I mean by a whole-grain type feed, even though there are "bits" containing vitamins, etc. that aren't whole grains:
View attachment 4141962 (Kalmbach Chickhouse Reserve)

FEEDERS:

For chicks, as in little guys, it works well on those long narrow chick feeders with the holes for their heads. Alas, it doesn't work well at all with gravity feeders, at least not for me.

As they reach 6-7 weeks or so, around the time they are fully feathered, they outgrow this type of chick feeder, and things get literally messy. I used heavy ceramic cereal bowls, which did keep the feed in one place, but they would climb into the bowl to eat, bringing along whatever form of litter you use.

Once mine turned 18 weeks or so and had some real size on them, I started using an elevated dog feeder, a little stand with two cut-outs for metal bowls, easily removed for washing at the end of the day, refilling the next morning. I still find random pine needles, etc. in the bowls, but they're a lot better about keeping their scaly feet on the ground and their beaks in the feed.

FERMENTATION FOR JUST A FEW CHICKENS:

If you do wind up with whole grain-type feed and want to ferment, the methods often vary due to flock size. I only have three pullets (for now, bwah hah hah), and at 20 weeks they generally eat not quite two cups a day. I ferment in two Mason jars. Initially, it does take a few days to get actual fermentation (as opposed to dampened feed) going. Two cups of feed plus de-chlorinated water added periodically through the day will fill a jar. Once that happens, I serve about 1/2 - 2/3 of it in the morning before letting them out of the run, so that they eat most of it, and then MOST of the remainder three hours before dark, leaving about an inch or two of fermented feed in the jar. I add two more cups of new feed, add the water, and give it a good stir. The remaining "old" (not spoiled) feed jump-starts the fermentation, and the jar will be ready to feed in a day and a half. So add new feed Monday evening, feed is ready Wednesday morning. On the day that this jar is fermenting, I feed from the other jar, so it will be nearly empty Tuesday evening, add the feed and water to remaining ferment, stir, and wait until Thursday morning when it's ready. It just keeps rolling along. With a larger flock, it makes more sense to use the multiple buckets that you'll see on Youtube, but this is great for just a few.

IDEAL AMOUNT TO SERVE:

Ha, good luck here! Even before we started yard-ranging them (letting them out of their run into protected areas of the back yard), their appetites were always boom-and-bust. Once they start getting nutrients and calories from non-feed, there's just no telling, and it will alternate between some waste and OMG We're On The Verge Of Death By Starvation days. (My pullets get dramatic on the subject of food.)

I bring in their bowls in the evening when we close up the coop. If there's a significant amount of food left, I keep it until the morning, dumping it out into one of their yard-ranging areas as a little present to find. (We have almost no rodent pressure; thank you, Weirdo Cat.) It does get eaten, presumably by the chickens.

But resign yourself to some waste. It's inevitable. I now have some dry feed available through the day in a gravity feeder. Yes, there's some waste, which I periodically dump into their run litter for them to find.

Thank you for that great post with tons of information. I am not new to chickens, but started again 5 years after a raccoon wipe out. My chicklets are 9 weeks old, and I have been feeding them some organic starter in a gravity feed. It is not hard because I take a screw driver with the lid off, and swirl it around. So far no waste for my girls, and one handsome roo named Reginald the Handsome. What I am new to is fermenting anything, let alone chicken food. So, thanks for your input. I do plan on soaking their feed in the hot weather to give more hydration.

 

[LyleVertigo]

I wrapped some shipping tape around the back and it prevents them from stepping in the troughs. Sometimes I still make a little ferment with the crumbles for boosting probiotics. I just take 1/3 of a jar, cap of ACV and top with water, then after a few days spoon some in their feed and refrigerate the rest for another time.