best Chicken feeder

[UtePassChickens]

Thats AWESOME! love the paint job as well! I like the feeder, but honestly i am sold hook line and sinker on the 5gallon bucket for the feeder for all the food actually stays in the feeder or goes into the chicken, i am about a month in with using it and not one bit of food on the floor! again that means more $$ stays in the pocket. by I love your set up looks really nice!

 

[BW56]

I have a treadle feeder I was given. Today I caught a squirrel using it. Later it was pigeons and doves. I also have a feeder I built after seeing some pictures somewhere. Its a covered five gallon bucket on three legs high enough for the hens to touch the bottom. I drilled a 1" hole in the middle of the bottom. I inserted a long 1/4" "ibolt" from the inside hanging down. I drilled a hole in a small lid from a soup can. I cut the lid from the edge to the center, overlapped the edges and put a fastener near the edge making it slightly cone shaped. I put the small can lid over the bolt and locked it in place with two nuts 1 1/2" under the bucket bottom to keep small birds from the food supply. The cone shape allows food to slide on down an off. A piece of rubber tubing locked on the bottom of the "ibolt" gives the hens a target to peck and receive food from over head. The hole and bolt are sized together with the food size. I use pellets, so my hole is large. Start small and increase as needed. I've seen small wild birds try to use it with no results. The hens have no trouble using it after a few lessons and there is no wasted food laying on the ground to draw the wrong critters. The only draw back is a cone (v) of feed left in the flat bottom of the bucket but I can live with that. I am going to discontinue the use of the treadle feeder. I will try and do pictures later if some one needs them.

 

[lazy gardener]

Ingenious. I don't use pelleted feed. (ferment instead) But, this is a great idea for the rare occasion when I might need to switch to pelleted feed. Waiting for your pic. Don't know if it would work for you, buy you might sketch out a schematic and post a pic of that as well. TY.