Feather picking?

[3KillerBs]

This I did not know! Thanks for sharing!

Maybe they do eat more than I think though? Their feeder is a 10# feeder and they eat about half of that a week between the 7 of them. I still have about 60# of this food as I over bought they ate 5# of a cheaper food in 2 days before I got this one delivered. I can def look at soaking, fermenting or buying something different next round.

Some people make wild claims about the benefits of fermented feed, but the chief advantages are:

• It makes it harder for birds to pick out favorites from whole grain feed and integrates the vitamin powder into said feed.
• It *can* reduce waste (though you can often get the same improvement from switching to a better-designed feeder)
• It *can* improve hydration in hot weather.

Here are a couple articles for you:

https://www.backyardchickens.com/articles/fermenting-chicken-feed-a-straightforward-method.75967/
https://www.backyardchickens.com/ar...ter-easy-fermented-feed-method-w-video.65375/

I personally do not ferment. I do sometimes wet the feed, especially in hot weather. But I use an moderately priced crumble and keep my feeders constantly full for free-choice feeding.

 

[rosemarythyme]

I second this
That may also be why they seem to not be eating very much of it. They could very well be just picking out the bits they prefer and leaving the rest. Especially since they are also getting the extra treats.

x3 on this. I also use Scratch & Peck grower along with a pelleted feed but I only feed the S&P fermented as you end up with quite a bit of waste otherwise. The powdery fines left behind contain the vitamins and minerals needed to make this a complete feed.

 

[aldarita]

One issue with whole grain feeds is that the birds may pick out their favorites and not get a balanced diet. Sometimes the dominant birds suffer one kind of nutritional deficiency from picking out the "bird candy" components while the low-ranked birds suffer a different kind by having to eat the leavings.

Some people serve this type of diet wet or fermented to reduce the birds ability to do this and, especially to ensure that they actually get the vitamin mix that is included in either pellet or powdered form.

Another issue I noticed with whole grain feeds is that they add nutrients in the form of powder to the grain mixture to get a complete nutritional formula for chickens. When the chickens pick at the grains, they leave all these nutrients at the bottom of the feeder therefore they're not getting all the nutrition they need, I ferment the whole grain feed to avoid this problem

 

[Shamiira]

Scratch and Peck now makes a grower crumble! We got that in and they eat quite a bit more they were def picking through the other feed. Everyone who had lost feathers are regrowing them now as well. No fighting or pecking going on. They’re all getting along pretty darn well! Thanks for all the help!

 

[cityhomesteading]

This I did not know! Thanks for sharing!

Maybe they do eat more than I think though? Their feeder is a 10# feeder and they eat about half of that a week between the 7 of them. I still have about 60# of this food as I over bought they ate 5# of a cheaper food in 2 days before I got this one delivered. I can def look at soaking, fermenting or buying something different next round.

This is the food I feed. I prefer organic, non gmo. I’ve found that if I don’t fill my 5 gal bucket all the way it helps. The powder and crumbles is all the good stuff so about once or twice a week I dump the remaining amount into another bucket and use that to ferment. So I’m not wasting any of that goodness. I feed this in the morning and at night. So they can eat out of their feeder but get the same food fermented twice a day. I just use a dog bowl. Fermenting the feed almost doubles the amount of food in the jar overnight and they love it. Then keep the scratch/kitchen scraps/etc to once or twice a day and only a handful.