Fermented feed vs dry feed

[Tesumph]

I'm more of trying to see how long 7 quarts of FF vs 7 quarts if dry feed lasts

Which one lasts longer and which on dosent.
I think I'll do both. First mine then what you suggested....

Sounds like a plan.

 

[chickengeorgeto]

Yes but what about the fermented feed? Water would add extra weight....

And the evaporation of the water in the feed being fermented will skew the data to a fair yea well.

Better to make two pens or runs, one fed on fermented feed and the other on dry feed. All the chickens shall be of the same age, sex, and breed, then weigh each chicken in each pen before feeding with fermented or dry feed begins then record the weight of each chicken from each run along with a tally of how many eggs each chicken laid, then you will have a better test. I want to =remind you that you will need to remove as many hens from one pen as died in the other pen while this experiment was under way.

The only sure way is to carefully weigh out each batch of feed to be fermented and use the dry weight as your total always trying to keep the total dry weight of both feeds the same for the same number of birds or the total number of hens or broilers in each pen.

That seems more than fair seeing that the people who ferment their chicken feed claim that fermented feed becomes greater on a dry volume basis or else there are vitamins, minerals, fats, and calories created out of nothing in fermented feed that are unavailable to chickens who ferment their own food inside of their respective crops or guts. This idea BTW violates the FIRST LAW of Thermodynamics which states that matter and energy can be modified or changed in form but that energy and matter cannot be created or destroyed.

https://www.allaboutscience.org/first-law-of-thermodynamics-faq.htm

This goes without mentioning the dangers of Aspergillus or other food borne illnesses like Botulism, which by the way is the most plentiful as well as deadly bacteria on Planet Earth and is in almost every teaspoon of dirt that you or your chickens see or touch.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/mone...have-sickened-395-people-15-states/896839002/

The US broiler industry alone (excluding eggs etc) is worth $95,000,000,000 so believe me if there was any advantage to feeding fermented chicken feed the Con-Agras,
Tysons, etc of this world would be already fermenting their feed and you couldn't turn on the boob-tube without being reminded of it.

 

[Morrigan]

Interested in the results of the experiment, but agree it's impossible to be exact.

I don't think FF is a magic elixir, but I like feeding it to my flock, and if done correctly should not result in mold or botulism. The thing I like the most about FF, is that the birds don't spill it all over the place, like they do with dry food, so I find less waste, and less feed lying around to attract rodents and wild birds.

I would be interested to know if the big commercial producers have every considered using it, or have studied it. If there were health detriments, or zero benefits, to FF, I might reconsider what I'm doing.

Off hand, I would speculate that factory farms would find it harder to store, mass deliver and clean up, then dry pellets. You can't have a big silo of fermented feed.

 

[Morrigan]

After posting, I found this article, The abstract suggests that FF resulted increased nutrition and digestive health for the chickens. The biggest draw back was the birds studied didn't seem to like it as much, which surprised me, as my birds race across the yard for it. I haven't read the full text yet.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19373724

 

[lazy gardener]

You can't do a comparison between dry and wet feed, unless you are fermenting the same amount of feed that you feed dry. Do you have growing birds, or are they all adults? If your birds are growing, a comparison of dry vs. FF over short duration of time will be skewed b/c the birds will, in theory eat more tomorrow than they did yesterday.

My suggestion is to feed out a bag of feed dry. See how long it lasts. Then feed out the next bag fermented. Alternate bags for 2 - 3 sets, then compile your data, and make your feed conversions.

When my flock is on FF, their winter conversion rate is .22 - .25 (all adults who are eating more because of cold weather). During the summer, their feed conversion rate has been as low as .18#/feed/bird/day.

 

[Kiki]

So one benefit for FF (fermented feed) is that the birds eat less of it. Well I am testing this idea out.

So I have 43 birds in 3 pens.
30 standered hens, serama cockrels, serama roos and bantams.
3 ducks
And 10 seramas (3 hens 7 chicks)

Dry food:
The pen of 30 eats 4-4.5 quarts a day
The pen of ducks eats .75 quarts
The pen of seramas eats 1 quart.

And FF I have yet to test

Today I am measuring and giving FF.
Pen of 30 has 4 quarts
Serama pen has 1 quart
And duck pen has .75
I will give FF for 3 days straight measuring and recording feed amounts and reporting here. After this test I will average out the feeding amounts and then feed dry feed for 3 days then average the amounts and compare the 2.
If I add any feed to the pens I will post here or any left over after the day.


I feed purina flock raiser and just ferment that and add pellet vitamins.

For dry food I just feed the feed

Let me know if you have any questions or suggestions for me!

What are pellet vitamins and why are you adding it to the FF and not to the dry?

I have been feeding FF for years and I can tell you that the amount of difference in the feed is minimal. I do not think you will notice that much of a difference.

I do not feed FF feed to save on feed costs.
I wouldn't advise anyone to feed FF to save on feed costs either.

 

[Kiki]

I'm more of trying to see how long 7 quarts of FF vs 7 quarts if dry feed lasts

Which one lasts longer and which on dosent.
I think I'll do both. First mine then what you suggested....

They will last close to the same amount of time.

 

[Squishychicken]

I'm starting to give out the bucket of 5.5 quarts of fermented feed tomorrow mornin since it is now fermented then doing 5.5 quarts the next day of dry food.