Debate on food, free range and egg quality...

[Shadrach]

I thought you were saying a chicken could eat a diet that DOES NOT PROVIDE the right amount of amino acids, and can still show NO SIGNS of deficiency.

Well, yes I'm saying that as well because that is also true. In order to know whether a creature is deficient in any chemical one would need to take a blood sample much as one would with humans. Like humans, chickens can be deficient in certain chemicals and show no exterior signs of this.
Most of the UK was deficient in one chemical or another after WW2 but they lived, many into ripe old age.

Now you are saying they can show signs of deficiency

Nope I didn't say that either.

If you want to argue with me then at least report or quote what I've said, not what you may think I meant.

 

[Badchickenpun]

You may even gets toads under big ones.

Get little garter snakes, for sure.

 

[NatJ]

If you want to argue with me then at least report or quote what I've said, not what you may think I meant.

You are responding to a post in which I quoted your exact words. Then I asked about what those words meant. (I was asking about the parts that I quoted. There were two quotes in that post.)

Are things displaying differently on your screen than mine, so maybe you did not see what I quoted? Just for clarity: I have ONE quote from @Shadrach in THIS post.

 

[Aunt Angus]

Do you know what you will plant in your grazing box?

Right now, I'm just using a seed mix i can get at a local nursery - lol! It has varieties of clovers, rye grasses, millet, buckwheat, trefoil, flax, and alfalfa. I am still learning about all of this, so this is a quick fix for now. It's a mix formulated especially for chickens, and it grows fast. I've used it before, and my birds seemed to do well on it.

 

[Shadrach]

You are responding to a post in which I quoted your exact words. Then I asked about what those words meant. (I was asking about the parts that I quoted. There were two quotes in that post.)

Are things displaying differently on your screen than mine, so maybe you did not see what I quoted? Just for clarity: I have ONE quote from @Shadrach in THIS post.

And stop shouting please.

 

[Florida Bullfrog]

I would strongly suspect that a number of the "I'll NEVER cull a bird!" pet chickens are over-fed fatty treats and die early from the effects of that diet.

Production-oriented people probably cull at the first or second molt because of the drop-off in laying.

Show breeders would be culling and moving on to ever-improving birds (not sure if their cycle would be as fast as the production people since a certain level of maturity is necessary to express the birds' full potential).

So probably not a lot of people keeping their dual-purpose flocks on a healthy diet until natural death from age-related causes?

However, I can't prove these speculations or even think of a way they could be adequately tested. *shrug*



Looking at the online shopping catalog for the grocery store I work at, you can get 18.75oz of sardines in water, 4 tins, for $5.

Before the current surge in prices -- as recently as May -- I could get 50# of Nutrina all-flock for under $20 and that would last my flock of 23 adults and some random juveniles approximately a week.

How much would I have to spend on sardines each week for that flock to supplement a deficient diet? And would my eggs taste fishy?

In my survival flock I value the old hens because they lay bigger eggs and have the world-wise experience. They make for being better mommas and raising stronger chicks. And they’ve generally passed the test of time. So I do not cull for age alone. I offset the lower egg numbers an individual older hen produces by having more of them.

I never thought to weigh eggs before. I did so last night. My free-rangers across various large breeds of both layers and full sized games make eggs that weigh 1.8-1.9 oz a piece. The little Cracker eggs weigh 1.2 oz. Tonight I will compare some coop-grain fed, American game bantam eggs to free range Cracker eggs. I’ll compare eggs that eyeball to substantially same dimensions to see of there is a difference in weight.

 

[Shadrach]

I'm going to talk to some chickens, but I'll be back.

 

[Perris]

I think the problem is when people try to make plant-only chicken foods. (That applies to a large number of the commercially-produced chicken foods, and to a large number of the do-it-yourself chicken food recipes that people like to share on the internet.)

given that chickens are omnivores, I think such people are misguided.

 

[Perris]

Sure they have - I've read some of the studies. Including studies on rates of reproduction, quantities of soil needed for particular densities of particular species of worms so you can calculate how much dirt with how many worms you need to produce a stable population from which you can extract "X" amount by weight of live worms daily to provide your chicken's diet.

Sadly, also high fat.
Would you like the math? I believe I left it in a post last month. If nothing else, I believe I linked one of the studies and could find it rapidly.

/edit Do you know the earthworm density of your soil? Grabbed a representative sample of dirt, sieved thru for earthworms? Then dried and weighed the soil? Did some quick math?

Do you assume its the same for everyone?

I have sandy clay/clay-y sands typical of parts of this are of FL, some GA, some Southern Alabama. For reasons of needing to bury electrical lines, I hand dug a trench 3' deep, 175' long, and about 9" wide thru my soils - soils substantially the same as those I use for my pasture. Care to guess how many earthworms I found? Hint: you have more fingers than I have earthworms.

you are confusing mealworms with earthworms.

 

[NatJ]

given that chickens are omnivores, I think such people are misguided.

I agree, but that's why they have trouble with the amino acids that are more easily found in animals and harder to find in plants.