Chicken feeders?

[Susan Skylark]

I think I know the answer but have to ask anyway! A girlfriend of mine has some five gallon pail no waste feeders for her chickens and I would love some for my new giant quail pen, I think there are quail scaled feeding ports out there but what happens if you use the chicken sized ones? I’m picturing creative suicide here but any experience with them?

 

[CliftonQuail]

I don't have any experience with chicken sized feeding ports, but suspect the quail would easily get inside the feeder through them. Then you'd end up with poop all over the feed. Whether the bird would be able to get out on its own is also a question.

 

[Susan Skylark]

I’ve been doing a little ‘redneck engineering’ or upcycling would be the trendy word with my feeders and waterers up to this point (cut the top off a vinegar bottle, invert it inside the base, add some holes and you have a decent No waste food hopper for a pen of 6). Those same feeders aren’t quite so handy in a group setting, especially when my aerodynamically challenged birds land on top of them. It’s easy to switch a water nipple from a peanut butter jar to an ice cream pail to upsize the water situation but can I do the same for the feeders so I don’t need to fill them every 36 hours? We just finished a gallon of ice cream (square pail) and after some rummaging in dusty cupboards I found some plastic spice containers with a 1.5” diameter. I fashioned the spice jars into feeding ports and put one in each side of the ice cream pail. It looks promising, currently watching to see what the birds think or if they’re are design flaws to work out. Or I could just order a set of ports off the inter web…