Chicken just started laying, what to feed now?

[sarahlorrain]

We have 4 hens, three wyandottes and one brahma. One of the wyandottes laid her first egg today, at 20 weeks old. They are being fed start and grow unmedicated right now and I have about 20 or so pounds of that left. What do I need to do now? Mix a layer feed with what I have left? Get oyster shell too??

 

[Eir]

Oyster shell is good and you can still mix the feed with the new stuff once you get it, though if you store it well enough maybe it'll still be good in time for any new chicks you hatch, but most likely not. For our chickens we use regular chicken feed and give them whatever table scraps we have leftover from the day. They also are let out for the whole day and feed on whatever they find on the ground in our pasture. Good luck

 

[sarahlorrain]

We don't have any roosters, so we won't be hatching any chicks. So that's not a worry. I just didn't know if layer feed had enough calcium in it or not.

 

[Eir]

Gotcha. Then any feed is fine so long as it's substituted with, like you mentioned, oyster shell or the table scraps. Even the things the chickens pick off the ground can count just because they will be picking up little rocks and insects. But yeah, calcium can be gotten from a lot of places. We grind up the eggs shells and give them back to the hens after breakfast lol The chickens are basically tiny composters and will eat anything.

 

[sarahlorrain]

Yeah, I forgot about the egg shells. I could do that. It would be cheaper for sure. They get table scraps, but not every day.

 

[Eir]

Then you should be fine

 

[mickey328]

When they lay, they need extra protein and calcium. Ground oyster shell or eggshell is great for calcium. We give ours all kinds of cheese (whatever's a bit old), yogurt (I make it from live culture), meat scraps and cooked dried beans.