FERMENTED FEEDS...anyone using them?

[kpgoldstar]

Wow! FF did a feather good on that gal!

Very nice feathering. I have had a few of those stories myself....recovered some birds back from a place of poor care and found them to be very sickly and molting severely, covered with lice and mites. In almost two month's time these birds were back on track with the FF....

Mama Chicken AKA Middle Sister the first week after returning home looking like 100 miles of bad road....



Same bird 7 wks later....




Raggedy Ann...first week home, possessing one tail feather...



Raggedy Ann, 7 wks after starting FF...plenty of tail feathers now!

What a totally awesome testimonial to the benefits of FF!

 

[Beekissed]

Bee, the first time I read this I thought that it was a little.....harsh. But then I read it again and realized that being in the chicken business takes a lot of responsibility and knowledge. Years and years of learning and training. That's why I'm so grateful that the first day I got on BYC I found the FF thread. You seem to have so much common sense and believe me I'm gonna be watching you. lol

Yes...I get that a lot. Folks seem to find my approach to birds and my advice rather hard core. I'm not that way to be mean or hard nosed about things...everything I do about chickens has a purpose that ultimately works out for the greater good of the flock and to decrease suffering if at all possible. It's not advice you will hear much nowadays and particularly on an internet forum but it's the truth as I know it.

Folks look at culling as a bad thing but it has been the single most useful tool that farmers and breeders have utilized to improve the genetics of animals since the beginning of time and is necessary in domestic animals as well as it is in the wild. For continuing a species, a breed, a trait, etc. death of a weaker, less desirable animal must happen. If that animal is already suffering, more the reason to put it out of its misery and out of the equation as quickly as possible.

I'm glad you read that again and gained some insight into the real necessities of developing a healthy, normal flock and I hope others do the same. It's paramount to the continuation of poultry keeping as a whole that the next generation understand how all these good birds with all these good traits got here in the first place....good flock management based on sound, objective decisions when it comes to selecting who goes and who stays. And the really good thing is that those weaker animals can become food for the family and also for other animals, so it's not a complete waste to cull them...they will do more good as food and nourishment than they will as part of the flock matrix.

 

[SaltyPaws]

Just saying hi and thanks to everyone on here (especially Bee!!). Got my first hatching eggs last January and hatched out some barnyard mixes with a homemade incubator.

Fed FF for awhile till I stopped over the summer (not sure why) and started spending a fortune on feed. I've switched back and now feed half layer mash half spent barley From a local brewery (FREE!!!) With some BOSS and a little alfalfa cubes all fermented. I've processed 4 extra crowing roosters but haven't eaten them yet.

We got a couple funky looking ducks recently that have improved dramatically on the FF. Unfortunately I Dont think I have before pics.

Anyways just saying hi!! And thanks!

 

[Beekissed]

Great feedback! Glad you could start back on the FF...I think you'll really enjoy the flavor of those birds.

 

[niqueie]

I am glad for your honest words. I'm not one to ever be offended by honest advice. I'm definitely not breeding these birds. I'm not allowed to keep roosters. I see the wisdom in your advice. Each of us has our goals for chicken keeping, but all of us as chicken keepers have a responsibility to raise the healthiest birds possible for our situations. Thank you for your help.

 

[Beekissed]

What did you decide to do for your picked on bird?

 

[niqueie]

I did try to save her, but she died. It's very sad, my kids and I think of our birds as pets. Dottie was a sweet brahma who hung out with our little bantams. She was suppose to be a large bird but instead was always small.

 

[Beekissed]

I'm sorry to hear that.

Raising chickens can be a heartache. They don't make the best of pets due to their propensity to up and die for no reason or from the fact they are on everyone's menu.

 

[Beekissed]

I posted about it on the other FF thread but I don't believe I mentioned it here, but I picked up a passel of free roosters a couple of weeks ago so that I could finish them up on FF to sweeten and mellow out the meat before processing. This is the second experiment I've done of this nature after it occurred to me that people were willing to give away perfectly good chickens they had poured time and feed into to get to a certain age. This new feeling of being unwilling to kill one's own chickens has turned into a great resource for those who can capitalize on the free meat. That would be me...if folks are silly enough to spend money to get a bird to eating size and then can't eat them, I'm going to take advantage of that.

To tell you how much this is happening, the fella I got them from had been doing this same thing of collecting roosters that folks didn't have the heart to kill and had already processed about 40 birds and had but this group left over. He said he didn't have time to do anymore birds because of deer season and so just wanted to get rid of them. Think of that...40 unwanted roosters out there, ranging from 2-4 lbs dressed wt, so we can say 3 lbs on average....that's 120 lbs of free chicken meat! I'll be getting almost 40 lbs of meat from these that I have.

Folks are giving away the money and time they invested in these birds because they can't kill them....all I can say is we live in one overly rich, fat country when folks can afford to give away fresh food in that volume.

This last pen had some very heavy, older birds of various breeds and some younger, lightweight leghorn mix cockerels. They were living in pretty bad conditions and they all were heavily infested with lice and mites, so they were dusted, dosed and slathered before setting foot on the land and confined to a temporary pen. Some had frosted comb tips, some combs were pale and they all looked pretty ragged in their feathering except one young Cochin cockerel with a bum hip who had some pretty plumage.

Here's a few pics a few days after arrival of the temp pen and the roosters:















When they arrived they stunk to high heaven and were a little worse for the wear but are really showing some gloss on the feather and cherry red combs now, not to mention no more stink. This FF really lines out the digestive system on a bird and takes away the smell of those feces. I'll try to take some pics of how they look now that they have had the FF for a couple of weeks and are living in cleaner circumstances with no more parasite infestation.

They've also been getting daily rations of black oxford apples from our trees, some BOSS in their bedding to give them something to do and whatever scraps I can throw in after I divvy up between the dog and the layer flock. Today they got two cheese balls left over from the holiday and some old bread. Everything that goes in that pen is consumed like it was a pig pen instead of chickens. These boys are heavy eaters.

 

[RoseMarie1]

Yes...I get that a lot. Folks seem to find my approach to birds and my advice rather hard core. I'm not that way to be mean or hard nosed about things...everything I do about chickens has a purpose that ultimately works out for the greater good of the flock and to decrease suffering if at all possible. It's not advice you will hear much nowadays and particularly on an internet forum but it's the truth as I know it.

Folks look at culling as a bad thing but it has been the single most useful tool that farmers and breeders have utilized to improve the genetics of animals since the beginning of time and is necessary in domestic animals as well as it is in the wild. For continuing a species, a breed, a trait, etc. death of a weaker, less desirable animal must happen. If that animal is already suffering, more the reason to put it out of its misery and out of the equation as quickly as possible.

I'm glad you read that again and gained some insight into the real necessities of developing a healthy, normal flock and I hope others do the same. It's paramount to the continuation of poultry keeping as a whole that the next generation understand how all these good birds with all these good traits got here in the first place....good flock management based on sound, objective decisions when it comes to selecting who goes and who stays. And the really good thing is that those weaker animals can become food for the family and also for other animals, so it's not a complete waste to cull them...they will do more good as food and nourishment than they will as part of the flock matrix.

yep you and me both on listening to her. My birds have really enjoyed her teaching me.