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Actually, this can be true if you have enough forage available on your land to provide most of the chickens' nutritional needs. The birds would also need to free range pretty much all the time as well. I know an old farmer who runs his chickens this way, and we were actually discussing all feed vs. free range with only supplementary feed a bit earlier in the thread.
This something of interest to me as an animal nutritionist. When birds are at low abundance and quality of natural forages is high, I am unable to come up with any formulation that is commercial or custom that can match the natural forages. As the number of birds increases relative to available resources, either the birds must range farther or some nutrients (protein, energy, vitamins, or some minerals) become limiting before other nutrients. During winter, energy becomes limiting first and can be supplied by increased amounts of scratch or sunflower seeds. During early spring when first flush of green growth figures highly in forages available, then protein seems to be limiting since insects have not had a chance to emerge in any numbers and the plant parts consumed seem high only in water and carbohydrates. During summer and fall months, pattern not so clear but some feeds / feedstuffs can compliment natural forages as well as any complete diet, at least for short periods of time. Problem I have noticed is that nutrients of shortest supplier varies considerably over time but the variations may follow annual cycles.
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