Feeding the meaties

[ScienceTchr]

Our meaties (that I think are the Jumbo's from McMurray) are about 4 weeks old now and happily living in their new chicken tractor. I've been picking their food up at night and putting it back down in the morning to keep them from doing nothing but eating. We are also feeding a starter/grower by Nutrena (slightly more expensive then regular broiler grower but they seem to be doing really well on it and we feed it to our layer pullets as well). I have noticed a few of the bigger birds are starting to have a harder time walking and I don't want these guys to be harmed at all by their desire to eat themselves to death. At some point should we start weighing out how much feed we give them? Or do we keep just giving them as much as they can eat during the day and picking it up at night? We do move them to fresh pasture daily and they do forage.

 

[ScienceTchr]

Oh and their feed is 18%.

 

[Life is Good!]

I controlled the amount of feed given to our FR's. Toward the end of their journey, they received the equivalent of 6C of feed 3x/day (breakfast, lunch and dinner). This spaced out their feed, forced them to forage (they did great!) on bugs and greens - and gave them something to look forward to. Did it cause them to grow slower? Perhaps. I did not increase their feed after a certain point as it seemed they did not 'finish' one meal before the next was placed in their feeders.

I also added in scratch - which I will not do the next go 'round. The scratch seemed to not be digested well and seemed to slow growth. I was giving scratch as a treat item to help them forage in areas I needed them to search through (slugs and other bugs in garden bed areas). Worked for the scratching up the bed, but not so great on their growth!

 

[ScienceTchr]

We are just raising our meat birds for our own consumption so a fast rate of growth isn't hugely important to us (raising our own is still FAR cheaper then buying from someone). We plan to do it again next year and DH and I are seriously considering looking at some of the other meat bird options out there. These guys were fine for our first try and they've done well but super fast growth rate isn't as important to us as having birds that are healthy, happy and raised as humanely as possible. The way these guys grow and how uncomfortable they seem walking around at even just 4 weeks doesn't feel humane to me (although they seem perfectly happy and we are giving them a good happy home and plenty of time to be chickens).