Feed costs are killing me!

[Tracydr]

I live in town and the costs 21% feed is just crazy, $25 a 40lb bag of Purina flock raiser, the only non-medicated feed I can find. Im raising some jumbo X and they are almost 7 weeks old. Can I add some plain grains like corn, oats and maybe even some alfalfa?perhaps some sunflower seeds or legumes? get some chicken scraps and are on bermuda grass.

 

[Mtn Margie]

I pay $18.50 for Flock Raiser. I would seriously start thinking about processing your CX's here pretty soon. I would supplement their food with grains if you need more time. Don't know about the corn so much, if you have bermuda grass, I would assume you live in a hot area.

 

[Meat Hunter]

25 bucks a bag???? Holy crap. Do you live in town or do you have access to any country coops? Years ago, I helped offset my feed cost for my layers with a bug zapper. Come morning, there was a nice LARGE pile of cooked bugs for the to eat lol.

 

[Nicole01]

Some people farm mealworms and fed them worms everyday, which cut the cost of feed. I also think your paying too much for the feed. Our medicated starter is 13.49 for a 50# bag.

 

[jerseygirl1]

I pay $15.99 for Flock Raiser, and $15.49 for chick starter medicated at Tractor Supply, and I thought THAT was expensive!

 

[itsy]

Where do you live?

I just purchased a bag of unmedicated "Sporting Bird Flight Developer" which my Agway calls "Poultry Game Grower" by Southern States. I switched to this because the stores' broiler feed was either medicated or organic. I purchased my first 25 lb organic (which was expensive as all heck) and only had a 20% protein. Basically, I want a higher protein, unmedicated, crumbled food.

So today I actually asked to walk through the warehouse to see all the feed they had. I've had so many issues with employees there not knowing their stuff, that I needed to just go and look myself.

I ended up purchasing a 50lb bag of crumbles of what I mentioned above because it's got 22% protein. It compares well to the broiler feed, but has a smidgen more of fat. I'm pleased that it's not medicated as I didn't want to feed that to the birds. I paid $16.99 for it. They also told me if I get deeper into the meat birds and am going to be ordering a large quantity of feed that they will be able to order whatever mix I wanted so long as I purchased 40 bags. I don't think that's going to happen in the near future, but it's good to know.

 

[centrarchid]

Look into using soaked oats to replace some of your medicated feed.

 

[Buster52]

Currently running about $9.50 for 50# sack.

 

[Tracydr]

I'm in Mesa, AZ. I've tried all the local feed stores and the prices are all pretty close. Most don't carry non-medicated feed. I'll try the soaked oats, I can get an 80 pound bag and I think it's only $14.00 if I remember right, I buy it for my horses but don't pick it up that often.
I'm planning to butcher in another week so not too much longer, except I still have my 22 little layers to feed and the 6 Banties. They really don't eat that much and are much better about eating kitchen scraps.
Anything else I should or could add? I've been giving lots of kitchen scraps but the dumb jumbos are too lazy or stupid(poor things) to eat anything that isn't a crumble. The Banties and layer chicks go crazy over rotten tomatoes, berries and greens. The jumbos ignore them or even run away from them.

 

[KatyTheChickenLady]

when you are supplementing you have to make sure 1. that the protein is usable and 2. that you balance what you are adding and taking away.
oats and barley have a different type of protein referred to as "sticky protein" which is not digestible by chickens unless it is cooked. soaking them won't help.
Sprouting them is a whole different story.
Corn is around 5-7 % protein and BOSS is about 16.5%
red wheat is fairly cheap and around 11% (soft white is only 6%)

a standard laying hen needs apx 16% protein feed.
Many people including my self feed higher to meat birds . . . but 16% will get you there eventually and MANY people do it on less.