FERMENTED FEEDS...anyone using them?

[wlhtx]

Thankfully, they aren't THAT bad. Coughing and fever, so bad enough to not go to school - but overall still energetic. In fact, there's a massive fort building contest going on in my living room as we speak. Kids...

 

[mandaleigh1981]

Thankfully, they aren't THAT bad. Coughing and fever, so bad enough to not go to school - but overall still energetic. In fact, there's a massive fort building contest going on in my living room as we speak. Kids...

With this last one, the 5 year old got it worse than everyone else (he was a preemie, and respiratory things tend to hold on longer). He had a fever, so had to keep him home, but he was running around like crazy. Then wanted to play games and watch tv in big brothers room, since its usually forbidden!

 

[Beekissed]

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The babying thing irritates me too Bee. I am trying to raise 4 children in a world where everyone is taught that their feelings are the only ones that matter, that everyone wins, and everyone is right. It is hard, and it angers me. Everyone shouldn't get a trophy. People are going to get made fun of and picked on. My son came home a couple days ago and said some girl said he wears his socks weird (he's 11, so they are at that age). I told him the next time someone says something like that to you, tell them, hey, this is me. If you don't like me the way I am, then you are not worth my time or effort in the first place. That's how I solve that.

I'm just that way! I'm a nurse, so my kids didn't get babied much about falling down, getting hurt, etc. I'm also the youngest of nine kids and got picked on every day of my growing up, so I'm not too sympathetic to that either. You get tough or you cry, so get busy getting tough because no one has time for a crybaby.



My three boys((only two pictured here) went through basic training quite well because drill sergeants screaming in their faces weren't near as intimidating as their mother, so they didn't feel demoralized by all the shouting.

I'm raising men here, not sissies.

Now, if I could just convince one or two of them to lay me some eggs. I'm not asking for a lot. I don't need them every day. I don't need all of them to lay. But I currently have 28 birds at or past POL and I have not had a single blasted egg in 3 weeks. Come on, girls! Mama just needs one egg every now and then - just for fun!!!

It's the time of year and you'll feel this way every year, though with that many birds you should be seeing at least an egg or two. My young ones are not quite POL yet and my oldsters have hit the fall slow down, so this is the time of year every year where you have a talk with them about feed going out and no eggs coming in. Just had that talk yesterday....went something like this: "Ahem. Killing cone is mounted on the tree, roosters will soon be dying...don't make me add a few hens to that number! Poop an egg and real quick about it."

 

[wlhtx]

Handsome boys you have there, Bee! And it sounds like they are just the kind that I am trying to raise. Be respectful (and slightly afraid) of Mama, but stand up to the rest of the world like a man. No whinin' or cryin' allowed.

And I think I'm gonna have to have that talk. I mean, this is just plain RIDICULOUS! "Poop an egg and real quick about it." Ha!

 

[mandaleigh1981]

I'm just that way! I'm a nurse, so my kids didn't get babied much about falling down, getting hurt, etc. I'm also the youngest of nine kids and got picked on every day of my growing up, so I'm not too sympathetic to that either. You get tough or you cry, so get busy getting tough because no one has time for a crybaby.



My three boys((only two pictured here) went through basic training quite well because drill sergeants screaming in their faces weren't near as intimidating as their mother, so they didn't feel demoralized by all the shouting.

I'm raising men here, not sissies.







It's the time of year and you'll feel this way every year, though with that many birds you should be seeing at least an egg or two. My young ones are not quite POL yet and my oldsters have hit the fall slow down, so this is the time of year every year where you have a talk with them about feed going out and no eggs coming in. Just had that talk yesterday....went something like this: "Ahem. Killing cone is mounted on the tree, roosters will soon be dying...don't make me add a few hens to that number! Poop an egg and real quick about it."

Yes! That is too funny.

You're boys are handsome, bet you are very proud of them. I have three boys as well, and one baby girl. And I am the same way. I figure if they can handle my sarcastic remarks and teasing then they will be able to handle anything. Laziness is not tolerated, and neither is complaining. And I always get compliments on their behavior, so I am doing something right!


This is them in August. Garyn is 11, Jack is 7, RJ is 5 and Kayleigh is a year old. Taken at the family cabin in Leakey.

 

[Beekissed]

Awwwwwww!!!!! Cuteness overload!!!!!

What a beautiful family! God has blessed you richly and it sounds like He has entrusted them to a great baby-sitter. You sound so much like me it isn't funny!! My kids and I cut each other down constantly and it's all in love...we cut up so much when we get together that I pee myself! When we go to a restaurant we have to keep reminding one another to not laugh so loud...pretty soon the waiter/waitress is laughing at and with us too and the rest of the patrons are wondering just what we are drinking.

So much fun and joy can be created when one doesn't take themselves so seriously and can feel safe enough to bare one's weaknesses to another...and then laugh about them.

And you know? I have always gotten compliments about my boys too....so polite, so sweet, so joyful, etc. The old folks just LOVE 'em and little kids at church just swarm all over them...I think it's because they have retained their joyful youthfulness but still respect their elders, so they are a big hit at church and just about everywhere else. God did a good job with those boys and I just got to reap the benefits of it all. We have such fun together and I never had terrible twos or tormented teens, every stage of their lives was just as fun as the stage before and we are still good friends.

 

[mandaleigh1981]

Awwwwwww!!!!! Cuteness overload!!!!!

What a beautiful family! God has blessed you richly and it sounds like He has entrusted them to a great baby-sitter. You sound so much like me it isn't funny!! My kids and I cut each other down constantly and it's all in love...we cut up so much when we get together that I pee myself! When we go to a restaurant we have to keep reminding one another to not laugh so loud...pretty soon the waiter/waitress is laughing at and with us too and the rest of the patrons are wondering just what we are drinking.

So much fun and joy can be created when one doesn't take themselves so seriously and can feel safe enough to bare one's weaknesses to another...and then laugh about them.

And you know? I have always gotten compliments about my boys too....so polite, so sweet, so joyful, etc. The old folks just LOVE 'em and little kids at church just swarm all over them...I think it's because they have retained their joyful youthfulness but still respect their elders, so they are a big hit at church and just about everywhere else. God did a good job with those boys and I just got to reap the benefits of it all. We have such fun together and I never had terrible twos or tormented teens, every stage of their lives was just as fun as the stage before and we are still good friends.

You saying that I sound like you is the best compliment I have had in a long time! I hope the Lord blesses me with the wisdom you have!

And thank you. My oldest is a carbon copy of my husband, but acts just like me. The middle boy and baby girl look a lot like me when I was little, and the littlest boy looks just like my little brother, and acts just like his Daddy. Randy Jr was definitely the perfect name for him. He walks like Daddy, and talks like Daddy; and is just as much a stinker too.

 

[KrazyChromatics]

ok so today i had a casualty .... drowned in the FF

i had 2 that were REALLY cold and near death so i just slopped some in one dish *i use 3 for 30ish chicks* they are something like 2 months old... so i rushed them inside under a heat lamp and forced some liquid drench and water on em every few minuets until they could sit up then stand, took little over an hr... tough little birds... anyway i didnt even close the pen door on my way out just ran em to the house... when i brought em back... sadness... a little pullet dead in the dish... looks like she got pushed in and trampled.... **** it i know better than to only fill one dish

i should have taken the 5 seconds to fill the other 2.... and it doesnt help that i ran out of dry mix and when i made up my last bit i added a pinch too much water, and i had apples in there for a few days (they LOVE bobbing for apples btw

) and hey must have juiced out a bit so now i have sloppy goo and i have to reach in the bucket half way to my elbow to keep most of the liquid out... such a dummy... picking up more today to fix this annoyingness!


but i decided to dissect this chick as i havent seen the effects of the FF on the internal organs yet as i havent butchered those birds yet... im impressed


look at the SIZE of that gizzard? and isnt that liver healthy lookin?


Gizzard contents.... that wad is a wad of felt fibers.... stupid birds....


look at my finger, and the size of that bile sack... thats HUGE!!!! bigger than any adult we have slaughtered


tip of my finger, that means it was a pullet right?

 

[Beekissed]

Time to get yourself a trough, sister! I'm assuming we are talking meat birds, so you need to let them spread out along a feeder so they won't trample one another. And that feeder can have holes drilled in the bottom so as to drain out excess fluid. And...another vote for not keeping the water over your feed and letting the water absorb until the feed is thicker in consistency.

Live and learn...I'm always living and learning. Certainly does look to have healthy organs but how in the world does a chick that old drown in feed?

Here's a pic of cheap and simple troughing for meat birds...cost about $8 total for a 6 ft. long trough(rain guttering):



Then I just cut it off to shorten it for my layer flock...which gives you two troughs of 3 ft. length each...for the same price!

 

[KrazyChromatics]

usually i have thicker than oatmeal for about 6inches then more soupy but not watery below that, a good stir (its a 30gal plastic trash bin... i have to remember to mix with my left arm a bit before the wedding... my right arm is disproportionate lmfao.... my mixin' arm chickens arent the only ones who benefit ) that way its not drippy and it doesnt stick to the scoop..

even my 2week old bantie chicks with their mama havent had problems with it.... theres one i named Gusto, cause hes covered in FF i chip off what i can but i figure he'll get feathers soon enough lol, these little ones are FF fed from the start and the parents were fed FF, out of 11 eggs 8 hatched, one was squished before hatch, one was premature, and one was infertile.... and they hatched during that cold snap.... tough babies!!

im thinking the other one just got mobbed and couldnt get back out, it was covered in FF but the dish was empty when i got back up well except for the chick... and there were bubbles around its beak.... ive never had that happen before...

and in the pen there are 3 silkie cross roos that i got yesterday, like 10 or so red crosses, 15 ameraucaunas, and a handful of bantam chicks and juvies, a happy community, never any fighting, love when they are too immature to care too much about that stuff..