Fermenting Feed for Meat Birds

[Beekissed]

When you get a little deeper into chickens you might find that you will add cattle panels to your list....so versatile, so many uses!

 

[erinszoo]

Ok, I just found this thread and am getting a shipment of 25 CX next week. We are interested in trying this and I have been reading through the early posts but I must have missed something. How long does this have to ferment to begin with? Do you keep more than one bucket going to have enough food each day that is fermented correctly? Or do you just keep adding to what's in the bucket and stirring it and using what you need? While I like the health benefits this seems to have, I am absolutely in love with the idea of less smelly poop from them. We've had them before and I was almost grossed out by the poo and the smell so much that I didn't want to do them again. Thanks for the help!

 

[Beekissed]

The fermentation takes as long as it takes, depending on the temps. Mostly it starts within a day(8-15 hrs) but I'd give it an extra day or two to get a good working culture, then use the backslopping to keep the microbial load in the mix, so you won't have to start from scratch each time and wait.

I raised 50 CX and just used one 5 gal. bucket, so it depends on how much and how often you are feeding if you will need more buckets of feed cooking/fermenting. I fed once or twice a day, depending on the age, and the one bucket system was all I needed.

It can't really "go bad" if you keep the yeast fed with new grains, so it doesn't matter how much you make up beforehand, as long as you add new grain to it after you take each day's FF out.

 

[daleeper]

In my experiment, I found that the CX that ate the 50/50 fermented crumble/whole grain mix had the lowest weights followed by the dry crumble, but the CX fed 100% fermented crumble were the heaviest.

It all came down to ease of digestability

Looking forward to your update and conclusion in that thread.

 

[Tivona]

So today is day 8 on the ff for my 15 ducks and 2 geese (the geese only get the ff for now) and I thought I would just update here as so few have mentioned doing this with laying ducks. 5 days into feeding the ff I noticed that the pen suddenly had no discernible odor other then the faint smell of the fermented feed. This is a huge improvement as I had been having some stink everyday I had to clean out, as the pen also holds their kiddie pool. With the poop always staying moist it would usually stink by the next morning.

I did take a brief dip in egg production for a few days but it could be that they had the dip due to not eating enough for the first few days of ff even though they had it available. They at first sort of just pecked a bit at it but yesterday they were hitting it pretty hard. I have 5 baby ducks, one drake, and 9 adult girls of whom 2 are currently molting. I had been getting about 6 eggs before starting the ff and then I only got 5 eggs for the last few days but not its back up to 7. The babies really love the ff. Everyone else is still adjusting.

I am providing dry egg layer pellets but only about 1/3 of the total feed for the day. The dry pellets go first but they are starting to munch on the ff while there is still dry layers pellets available. I will probably be fermenting the layers pellets but currently I only manged to get one bucket with a lid so that will have to wait. The feed that I am fermenting is Waterfowl feed pellets. I just dip into the bucket with a salad spinner inner basket. The thing has extremely good drainage and is working much better then the colander that I had originally tried when I got the bucket going.

 

[armorfirelady]

When you get a little deeper into chickens you might find that you will add cattle panels to your list....so versatile, so many uses!

Its kind of funny you say that....as I pass TSC and go to my local feed mill I have checked to see if they have had them ....havent seen them yet

 

[Beekissed]

They are usually out to the side where all the other fencing rolls and metals gates and such are kept. You can ask about them at checkout and they tell you to pull around to the side to get them loaded.

 

[armorfirelady]

I figure if I dont see them then I cant buy them But......I have ideas on what I want to use them for already......so they are a spring purchase unless I find they have been marked down for the end of the season.

 

[Beekissed]

Shadowmane, where the heck are ya? I haven't heard from you in ages and wonder if you are alright? Your thread is busting out!

Will finally get a chance to try this on my layer flock and will report the results as soon as I see any. Can't wait!

 

[knjinnm]

Hi All,
I just found this string and still catching up. I thought this bit of information was interesting, has anyone noticed a difference in hatch-ability with the information listed?

Someone mentioned feeding hogs FF, has anyone tried FF on horses?
The reason I ask, we have seven year old non-raced thoroughbred gelding, we were having trouble keeping weight on him.We switched him from grass to alfalfa, he is wormed on regular basis, floated his teeth, added senior glow feed supplement and soaked beet pellets. He is back up to about 1200 pound and looks good but I would like to get him off regular worming and wonder if fermented beet pellets would do the trick?
Thanks,
Joe

From page 12 post 117
"6. The use of fermented feed increased egg weight in the period from 34 to 37 weeks (61.4 vs. 60.0) and increased shell weight (g/100 g egg weight, 10.2 vs. 9.9) and shell stiffness (N/mm, 161 vs. 150) of eggs collected at 37 weeks. "