DIY Ideas needed for meat bird feeder

[imacowgirl2]

I need everyones ideas, because my brain just isn't coming up with a solution, and I really want to figure this out!

I currently have two of these high capacity feeders for my meat birds (New Hampshires, not Cornish Cross, so I dont need to limit feed) -- they're little guys still, only about 5 weeks old so the two feeders are currently working fine.

However, we're quickly getting to the point where only 3-4 birds at a time can eat, and its starting to cause scuffles when they wake up in the morning.

My last batch of meat birds, I fed in a 10 foot long gutter -- which worked great, but it meant I had to fill it twice a day every day, because it didnt have enough capacity to hold enough feed for those voracious eaters!

I would love to be able to combine the two ideas somehow, and essentially build something about 10 feet long that holds feed like these high capacity feeders -- anyone have any ideas on starting points?

I also really really want to be able to fill the feeder from outside the pen...because when these guys are hungry, they mob you like crazy!

 

[Al Gerhart]

Send those back if they are new. $52.00 a pop, $33.00 less than a treadle feeder with non of the benefits.

You didn't say how many meat birds but I'll assume 100. You would be feeding 25 pounds per day once they hit a couple of pounds each and to get to that two pounds weight they will probably have consumed five pounds of feed each or 500 pounds. Say you feed them out to six pounds live weight, you will have fed around 22 pounds assuming you get a commercial grower feed conversion rate.

Between four and eight weeks you will be feeding just over three pounds of feed per week so a fifty pound bag will feed roughly 15 to 16 broilers per week at the ages of four to eight weeks. Less in the first couple of weeks, more at the end.

So, those feeders aren't the best and until you have a rodent or wild bird problem you do not need the best feeders. You might get a year's worth of meat raised and be done before the vermin find you. That gutter trough looks pretty good in my opinion.

 

[NatJ]

I need everyones ideas, because my brain just isn't coming up with a solution, and I really want to figure this out!

I currently have two of these high capacity feeders for my meat birds (New Hampshires, not Cornish Cross, so I dont need to limit feed) -- they're little guys still, only about 5 weeks old so the two feeders are currently working fine.

View attachment 4295421

However, we're quickly getting to the point where only 3-4 birds at a time can eat, and its starting to cause scuffles when they wake up in the morning.

My last batch of meat birds, I fed in a 10 foot long gutter -- which worked great, but it meant I had to fill it twice a day every day, because it didnt have enough capacity to hold enough feed for those voracious eaters!

I would love to be able to combine the two ideas somehow, and essentially build something about 10 feet long that holds feed like these high capacity feeders -- anyone have any ideas on starting points?

I also really really want to be able to fill the feeder from outside the pen...because when these guys are hungry, they mob you like crazy!

Have you considered or tried the hanging tube kind? I'm thinking of the big metal ones that have a tube to hold the feed, and a pan at the bottom for the birds to eat the feed.
Examples:
https://www.tractorsupply.com/tsc/product/harris-farms-30-lb-hanging-feeder-2167141
https://www.mcmurrayhatchery.com/hanging_feeder.html
https://www.amazon.com/Harris-Farms-Galvanized-Hanging-Feeder/dp/B006ZUNIWQ
https://www.strombergschickens.com/poultry-supplies/40-lb-capacity-hanging-feeder/

That style of feeder can hold a lot of feed because of the wide tall tube, and it allows many birds to eat at once because the trough is all the way around the outside of it. Since you do not need to limit feed, you could fill it before it runs out, and that would prevent you being mobbed by hungry birds.

If you have the ability to hang such a feeder, it works really well. Adjust the height as the birds grow, so the feeder lip is about level with their backs. I'm not sure about situations where you cannot hang the feeder-- it might not work so well then.

You said you used a 10 foot long gutter in the past. With the round feeder, it does not need to be quite as big, because of what happens when chickens stand in a circle and eat from the feeder in the middle: all those big bodies are further out making a bigger circle, while their heads reach the smaller circle of the feeder in the middle. So they don't need as much total length of feeder, as compared with a straight line where each bird needs the whole width of their body available if they want to reach the food at all.