Fermented Feed

[ChickChic00]

Would Fermented Feed that includes, Whole Oats, Corn, and Sunflower Seeds be a good whole diet for my chickens? Hear me out please.i have over 200 chickens, most are free ranging and go in a house at night. I give them grit and oystershell on the side for them. Could I cut costs by feeding them those three things fermented? Also giving them fresh grass that I usually pick and give them. And mealworms and some added apples and some squash once in a while? Would that be healthy for them? I sometimes feed them scrambled eggs too. I also give them vitamins in their water along with once a week of ACV in their water too. Any help is very much appreciated!! Thanks in advance!!

 

[TOR]

HI,
I do not ferment feed. I am not expert.
From what I have read and watched on youtube fermenting is suppose to cut feed cost because fermenting makes the food more digestible so the chickens get more out of the feed. SO I have read.
You do not want to make oats more than 50 percent of their diet.
Whatever you feed your chickens you want it to be a or try to make the ration meet your chickens nutritional needs.
You also free range so the chickens are also getting some of those vitamins, minerals, protein and etc. free ranging.
Would those 3 ingredients be a good whole diet..sorry I do not know. Cut your cost by fermenting. From what I have read yes.

 

[writerskramp]

Would Fermented Feed that includes, Whole Oats, Corn, and Sunflower Seeds be a good whole diet for my chickens? Hear me out please.i have over 200 chickens, most are free ranging and go in a house at night. I give them grit and oystershell on the side for them. Could I cut costs by feeding them those three things fermented? Also giving them fresh grass that I usually pick and give them. And mealworms and some added apples and some squash once in a while? Would that be healthy for them? I sometimes feed them scrambled eggs too. I also give them vitamins in their water along with once a week of ACV in their water too. Any help is very much appreciated!! Thanks in advance!!

Been fermenting feed going on 1.5 years.. "Whole Oats, Corn, and Sunflower Seeds" would seem to be lacking something. I am no dietician, i.e. cracked corn looses protein content setting in feed bags. Cracking yourself solves that issue. I use crumbles, so who am I too judge.. as fresh actual 'back in the day' laying mash seems nonexistent.. Have used pellets in a pinch, ends up a little thicker due to volume because of compression.. Add more water to cover than with crumbles. Sunflower seeds unless shelled, don't think fermentation would be of much effect on the unshelled, they float.. Maybe a little on whole corn.. Grinding would resolve that issue.. Fermenting actually unlocks vitamins, such as 'K' which otherwise would remain unavailable. Only have somewhere in the neighborhood of 35, yet feel your pain. A heated bowl in winter.. or it freezes. Fermenting feed did cut my bill by up to 2/3rds, and chickens seem much more satisfied. They also consume much less water.. Free ranging would boost protein more than you can provide in feed I would think.. except in winter. Eggs were never better than when I did, I must say. Fermenting, the three day challenge. How I do it. Starting with three 5 gallon food grade buckets from the farm store.. A #2 on the bottom is the secret code for food grade, they all are and cheap. Oh, and you want to loosely cover to keep out bugs and keep in the perfume a little.. I fill the first with one an one half #10 cans of crumbles, add three #10 cans of well water and stir. The same principle as brining pickles, keep them submerged.. and will expand almost double in volume. Second day, repeat in second bucket, stir each.. Third day, third bucket same. I use a forth bucket with holes drilled and metal window screen in the bottom to hold in the mash and drain half a day.. over a fifth. Dumping the squeezing's over garden soil or around fruit trees and such.. Just not where you'll be planting by seed shortly. Corn gluten has a sprouting inhibitor. In the summer the process can speed up, and in winter slow.. do my work indoors, not unheated barn or shed. I tend to stay with three days nonetheless. No need to flush the buckets, use as inoculant for next batch.. but will need hosing out occasionally. Do it in the tub in winter rarely, with a hose in summer. I'm single, so no one to complain. It's fragment and a little messy with mishaps.. and if it dries on your floor to a white powder, have fun getting that up. That's long enough ramble.. any question. I check in usually daily for distraction from the daily grind. No pun intended.. Take care.

 

[TOR]

Extra vegetables used as feed given to chickens is good. apples, squash. etc.
some info about oats, there is more on the net.
https://eorganic.org/node/8104

I use oats in my chicken feed, but maybe 10 percent. I also use whole black sunflower. Maybe 2 percent sunflower.

 

[glib]

That diet will have more proteins than if it were not fermented but probably not enough (of course you have to ferment the grains after cracking them). It depends on how many bugs they can find on their own but not all of them range you say. Is there any way you can get butcher trimmings (including blood, but mostly guts, lungs, stomachs, etc), pan fish, road kill, or set up a vermicompost or other bug producing facility? A source of whey would also solve your problems, specially if you use if as a ferment starter. You could also give them back the egg whites, if you like me eat a whole lot of yolks, but that will scarcely make a dent on the diet of 200 chickens.

 

[ChickChic00]

That diet will have more proteins than if it were not fermented but probably not enough (of course you have to ferment the grains after cracking them). It depends on how many bugs they can find on their own but not all of them range you say. Is there any way you can get butcher trimmings (including blood, but mostly guts, lungs, stomachs, etc), pan fish, road kill, or set up a vermicompost or other bug producing facility? A source of whey would also solve your problems, specially if you use if as a ferment starter. You could also give them back the egg whites, if you like me eat a whole lot of yolks, but that will scarcely make a dent on the diet of 200 chickens.

I can go catch some fish, also I give them some mealworms too.

 

[glib]

I can go catch some fish, also I give them some mealworms too.

I buy only grass fed meat, and my butchers have generally been generous to me. Free back fat, for starters, and sometimes free liver and tongue, but surely guts can be had in abundance.

 

[writerskramp]

I buy only grass fed meat, and my butchers have generally been generous to me. Free back fat, for starters, and sometimes free liver and tongue, but surely guts can be had in abundance.

That takes guts.. but some would just call that tripe.

 

[notachickennut]

That takes guts.. but some would just call that tripe.

I feed that to the dogs.

Would Fermented Feed that includes, Whole Oats, Corn, and Sunflower Seeds be a good whole diet for my chickens? Hear me out please.i have over 200 chickens, most are free ranging and go in a house at night. I give them grit and oystershell on the side for them. Could I cut costs by feeding them those three things fermented? Also giving them fresh grass that I usually pick and give them. And mealworms and some added apples and some squash once in a while? Would that be healthy for them? I sometimes feed them scrambled eggs too. I also give them vitamins in their water along with once a week of ACV in their water too. Any help is very much appreciated!! Thanks in advance!!

For fermenting feed, keep issuing your commercial feed & ferment it. Less waste, less spillage, more nutrients available to the chickens.
We use three 5 gallon buckets, at the beginning you might want to start with only 1/2 full & increase as you figure how much your feed swells (overflowing buckets are a stinky mess). Fill water into bucket till feed is covered with at least 1” of water. Seal lid on top, let sit for 3 days. Pour off any standing “water” (aka mother) into a clean bucket and feed the chickens the wet sour fermented feed. Now add feed to the bucket with the mother, fill with water to cover at least 1”. Repeat each day.

I occasionally add, Oat groats, Corn, Scratch mix, sunflower seeds, dried peas, beans & excess rice (from a grocery salvage store) and even dried seaweed a friend brought for us. When adding these “treats” I make certain they go in the bucket first, then the commercial feed on top (50/50 All Flock/Eggstra Layer Feed). After I add the water, I give it all a good stir.

We’ve done this long enough I can keep the mix about 1” from the top of the bucket.

Hens & roos are healthy, eggs are large & plentiful, no wasted feed & reduced feed costs by almost 1/2.