BREEDING FOR PRODUCTION...EGGS AND OR MEAT.

[hellbender]

Same here. My young ones have increased vigor, better weight gain and faster feathering on the FF. The wet feed seems easier for them to digest and , as it is predigested, they seem to get more out of it, as opposed to regular feed that mostly ends up on the brooder floor as poop. Most folks report the same good results, so it may be a case of YMMV.

With me I have a increase in egg production and the young ones that i have right now are eating a tray full of food every day while last year at the same age they would just pick around in the same only unfermented food.

Beekissed and jbkirk...I have absolutely no doubt about what you say. In fact, most other folks that I've talked to tell me they had results similar to yours.

When I first started using FF, I was making very large batches and mixing it with my 'special formula' and fed all the birds the mixture and everything was gobbled down in pretty quick order. I then decided to start 35 youngsters on it when they were about 2 months old. At first, they really liked it and did well with it but about the 4th week into it, they slowed to an almost stop. They were in a 3 acre grow-out pen and had pretty good pickins that they went after but never really ate enough of the FF to keep me comfortable. They were smaller than the other birds in the same hatch and I decided when the non-FF pullets began to lay and the FF birds had laid not a one, I started mixing in the 'formula' 'til I got rid of all the FF and that was that.

Maybe I shouldn't have begun feeding them with the regular starter feed or perhaps I might have continued on a bit longer but I didn't and that was the end of my FF experiment.

My son wants to start our new pigs on FF and that's fine with me. I can't imagine anything they won't eat.

 

[Kev]

I've tried to ignore this but I just can. You mention that the fermented feed cuts cost and I know it does ....but at what trade-off?

I tried a group of youngsters on FF last year and it's true, they don't eat nearly as much as my other birds did. However, the birds fed FF essentially failed to thrive. I'm glad I started them out right for the first two months because I feel that some of them might not have made it.

So...I can say I tried it but I'll never do it again.

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For anyone who is interested: Daughter has agreed to take some pics of her hybrid chicks when they feather out a bit more. One of them in not Naked Necked, but that's fine and dandy. I think it's going to be a nice big pullet. These are all big hefty chicks...just what I had hoped for.

Jason took a few pics of the farm that he asked me to post so here they are. It's still pretty cool here (about 22* F) but the sun is beautiful! Supposed to get down to negative 7*F tonight/early tomorrow morning. None of these are of any significant meaning or importance...he just liked what he saw, I guess. lol

What kind of rock and how old do you know? It's cool looking, we don't really have rocks with that appearance out here.. I'd be tempted to pry some layers just to check for fossils.

You live in a beautiful place! Tell Jason he takes great pictures.

 

[thedragonlady]

Quote: Great photos ! Fermented feed freezes in the winter, and molds in the summer. Who wouldn't eat less ? Been there; done that. Not again.

 

[hellbender]

What kind of rock and how old do you know? It's cool looking, we don't really have rocks with that appearance out here.. I'd be tempted to pry some layers just to check for fossils.

You live in a beautiful place! Tell Jason he takes great pictures.

I'm not really up on rocks but this is some kind of shale. Fortunately, this place is almost totally under laid with Marcellus Shale and that is better than the coal deposits that will never be touched as long as I'm alive. (unless the bottom falls completely from under natural gas!!!)

Oh...Thanks, I'll tell him! He claims there is a beaver on the other side of the pond but I can't see it.

 

[Dead Rabbit]

Wild and wonderful west va........mr HB. I live in botetourt county va. Very similar landscape. I never tire of it.

Yrs ago I fermented oats. Similar in method of what Alan butler's recepe calls for. Which was posted on this thread some 100's of posts back. I never did ferment layer ration or grower ration. I never heard of such a thing till coming to this site. I stopped fermenting the oats because I didn't see anything positive from all the labor involved other than the softening of the oat hulls. What I did see was a lot more droppings and they were runnier. But other than that I saw no negatives. But no true positives.
I know the oat hulls are much easier to digest when softened. Plus the fowl were more apt to consum the oats with softened hulls. Well I discovered that soaking the oats for a couple days had same affect in softening the oats hulls without the fermentation process. It was a win win without the excess runny droppings and without all the labor involved with fermenting them

I know many swear that fermenting oats will put a good body on a bird. I can honestly say one way or another.

I know plenty of people that swear by fermentation of grains and I know plenty that feed nothing but dry feed. All do wonderful and raise beautiful healthy fowl

 

[Dead Rabbit]

What I do now is feed dry feed in hanging self feeders. They stay full. I built feed troughs that I use to feed scraps and supplement food stuffs. I will daily pour a small portion of their layer ration in these troughs and pour water over it. So it soaks to a mush. They love it and clamber over that trough like they are starving to death. I feel it's a good way to give them a little something different and add moisture to their system. Something necessary for layers esp in the brutal cold and in the heat of the summer.

 

[dfr1973]

I ferment scratch, and the chickens act like it's a treat. They also get dry scratch, age-appropriate chicken crumble, the chicks in grow-out tractors get grass and bugs and the occasional little lizard that blunders in. The adults in the stationary coops get greens in the winter, lawn clippings in the summer, any leftovers left too long in the fridge, cooking mistakes, bones to pick clean, and all the hornworms I find on my tomatoes. I figure chickens are omnivores, and made to eat a varied selection of food.

 

[hellbender]

Hey Kev...it turns out there is a reason for one of the pics. He is using it to persuade his sister to let the miserable ducks to be put here instead of the bluegill pond. This pond has small mouth bass, catfish and some bluegills/sunfish and is at least 5 feet deeper. The down side is that it is about .25 mile farther from the house but she needs the exercise anyhow and if she doesn't feel like walking, there is always a 4-wheeler.

It's a pretty level place to build a coop but I don't know what would be involved in getting the electro-fence around it.

In all honesty I hope he can get her wrapped up in the chickens, rabbits, goats and maybe even a d###ed horse if it comes right down to putting the duck thing to rest. I'm trying to keep her busy and motivated because I haven't seen her look so well since the accident but I don't want to make everyone else in the house miserable. If the duck thing really has a grasp on her, it's do-able but I'd rather have a horse again instead. We're already set up for one or two....tack and all.

If she persists for another week, I'll wave the horse idea under her nose and see if that can quash the duck spell and we can find a horse or two before the weather begins to get warm...Spring is the absolute WORST time to buy a horse!!! I've kept my CRHA membership up, even though there hasn't been a horse on this place in about 15 years so I might start quietly putting out feelers for a couple of good geldings...a reasonably hot one for Jason and a settled aged horse for Ariel.

That is all...lol

EDIT: Kev...If you get a wild hair and can get over this way, you are welcome to dig around on these rock formations 'til your hands bleed. There are lots of these outcrops of all sizes.

 

[southernmomma]

Quote:
I've not had much luck with fermenting feed either. It hasn't done well by the chicks. I have offered soaked feed which was popular but the fermented stuff....no thanks

I suspect it could be different with whole grains, but the starter didn't seem quite right once it was "fermenting".
M

 

[DesertChic]

I've not had much luck with fermenting feed either. It hasn't done well by the chicks. I have offered soaked feed which was popular but the fermented stuff....no thanks

I suspect it could be different with whole grains, but the starter didn't seem quite right once it was "fermenting".
M

I tried feeding my most recent hatchlings the FF from the start with horrible results...mainly mess and lots of leftover food at the end of the day. I found myself bathing the feet of my chicks for an extended length of time as I tried to soften and wash off hardened FF, so I switched back to my dry organic starter feed until they were older. Now that they're 4 weeks old I give them FF feed part of the time and dry feed part of the time as they seem determined to have something to dump out and dig after in the brooder. I did notice that a couple of my smaller chicks eat the FF with tremendous enthusiasm and are now quickly catching up to the others in size and weight, making me wonder if they were just not getting enough of certain nutrients from the dry feed that they now get with the FF. All of my birds get a variety of foods including produce scraps from the kitchen, sprouted grains, a variety of fresh greens I grow for them in my garden, meal worms, every bug we can find for them, etc. plus both dry and fermented feed. I guess I'm just big on variety.