FERMENTED FEEDS...anyone using them?

[Beekissed]

Yep...it's hard to stir kraut or pickled corn, so those mold skins form and are easily removed, but the feed is stirred daily upon feeding and the whole yeast layer/covering is disturbed and dispersed, so the mold has nowhere to get a foothold. Well...except on the rim and sides of the bucket if you don't keep those scraped down.

 

[Leigti]

Can I add alfalfa to a ferment mix?

 

[shortgrass]

Can I add alfalfa to a ferment mix?

I do, but they're pelleted already. Alfalfa pellets ferment great, just need to add a bit more water because they fluff up so much and expand quite a bit.

A nice point though, my chooks would always leave the pellets for last, and most times end up dumping them, but since I ferment now, they are forced to eat the whole pan since they can't pick the goodies out first anymore

 

[lazy gardener]

Happy day for me! The flock has been able to be fed outside for the past 2 days, as the day time temp has gotten up above 32*! Spring is surely on the way!

 

[gizzyntaz]

I was so happy to be using fermented feed during this blizzard. My girls aren't laying yet, so have limited water intake. During the blizzard they refused to come down to the run where their food and water was. I gave up coaxing and just put a dish of FF in the henhouse for food/ water requirements. Once the storm passed I cleaned up enough for them to come down. If I hadn't been using FF I would have felt obligated to put water in the henhouse causing spillage issues, etc.

 

[lazy gardener]

I agree that one of the unrealized benefits of using FF in the winter is the water content. My flock of 25 is getting by splendidly with their little 5 qt heated water bowl, and fermented feed. I only have to top off the waterer every day or two. I expected that with the flock being bigger this year (was 16), that I'd have to upsize the water container. Not an issue.

 

[Beekissed]

I've got 14 LF in my coop and I can't see where they have been using water at all...if they are, it's minimal. I don't even fill my water bowl up any longer because it gets dirty before it goes down enough to fill, so I just put a little less than half of the bowl's worth of water in it and work from there. I don't see much usage in that amount at all. Normally I'm emptying it out and giving clean water more than filling it back up because it's diminishing.

 

[aart]

I've got 14 LF in my coop and I can't see where they have been using water at all...if they are, it's minimal. I don't even fill my water bowl up any longer because it gets dirty before it goes down enough to fill, so I just put a little less than half of the bowl's worth of water in it and work from there. I don't see much usage in that amount at all. Normally I'm emptying it out and giving clean water more than filling it back up because it's diminishing.

If there's snow on the ground, my waterer doesn't need much refilling either.

Did you get snailed by the snow storm @Beekissed

 

[Beekissed]

Don't know what "snailed" means, but we got a pretty little snow, our first true snow of this abnormally warm winter. We all were thrilled..humans, dogs and chickens alike. Pics abound!

My dirty winter flock breaking trail for me... the dirt bibs are from eating FF and then dusting in the DL afterwards.

 

[aart]

ha! snailed isn't even an easy typo from nailed...not sure what happened there.