Fermenting Feed for Meat Birds

[Beekissed]

Not a thing...that's the good stuff! A young fellow on the other forum threw it out because he thought it was mold.....and it IS mold. The good kind...give it a sniff. Is it sour smelling? Does your fermented mix have little bubbles in it? Then you off to a good start with your fermentation. Give it a stir and get that all mixed into your feed. The next day you will see the same thing. The bacteria that are produced by fermentation ARE a mold but they are the good kind and as long as you feed them, provide them with air every now and again(stir it up) and keep them wet, they will continue to grow well.

Many is the time I moved the mold layer off of pickled corn or kraut to get to the goodness underneath, so not all mold is the bad kind. Think sourdough bread..to make a sourdough starter you just place two cups of flour in some water and leave it somewhere warm and open to air. Within a few days you will see that flour bubbling and smell a faint sour smell...that mix has pulled yeast mold spores from the air and they are currently eating the flour mix. Yum.

 

[Sunny Side Up]

Please indulge a few questions about "Do-It-Yourself ACV" -- I have about 1/2 cup of unpasturized ACV left in the amber glass bottle, and a new plastic gallon jug of the cheap pasturized ACV from WalMart. Should I pour 3.5 cups of the WalMart vinegar into the glass bottle? And then continue to replenish it the same way when the glass bottle gets near the end? Or pour 1/4 cup of the live ACV into the WalMart gallon jug?

Should I leave it covered or uncovered for a while? How long do I let the mixture set before it can be considered live ACV?

I'm still learning about this and don't have enough experience to judge it by eye or nose. I figure answers are going to be guess-timates, that's okay. I hope to glean from others' experience.

 

[Beekissed]

Do you have a mother in your 1/4 cup of vinegar? You should be able to see something there if you pour the mix through your hands...it should have a clear to slightly cloudy snot appearance...sometimes it looks like the stuff around frog eggs and sometimes it looks like a rubbery disc with flecks of vinegar sediment in it.

If you don't have a mother that you can see, I'd try a little experiment. I'd place some apple juice(it doesn't matter what kind or how much, really) in the jug with the UP/ACV and put a paper towel over the mouth and secure it with a rubber band. Place the jug in a dark cabinet or even in a corner of a warm room but place a towel around the jug so that the mix is in the dark. Wait a week, give it a little swirl now and again to encourage aeration.

Within a week or so you should be able to see a smoky swirly something suspended in the middle of your juice/vinegar mix. If you do, that is a mother. If you don't, it could be that the cultures in your UP/ACV are not active/live and won't be present no matter how much regular ACV you mix with it.

If you do have a mother intact or even pieces of a mother, just add the whole jug of the regular ACV and do the above procedure...darkness, air, swirl now and again but not too much...just a gentle one. If your cultures are active, you should see them forming a mother in the new vinegar just like in the apple juice mix previously mentioned.

If you've been successful in that, I'd just not let your MV get so low next time...when you get a half jug, split it off into an empty jug and add regular ACV and add the rest of the ACV to the MV jug so you have two jugs with cultures in them. Use out of the MV until the extra jug has had time to get a good mother going. Top off the jugs with MV with regular ACV when you start to see them getting low and just keep things going exponentially.

 

[Sunny Side Up]

Thank you very much, that was a fantastic & thorough explanation!

 

[Zootopia]

Ok, so what about raising Turkeys on this?

 

[Beekissed]

Why not?

They are monogastric like chickens, so it can only help them utilize the nutrients in their feed better also.

 

[Beekissed]

Here is a short video of my bucket system just after I lifted it to drain off the fluid. It also shows a pic of my rain gutter feeder I built...crude but it works! I also tried to picture the nature of their droppings from eating free range forage and this feed. When the other video gets done uploading, I'll post it also. It is of my CX free ranging.

 

[ROCKIN R FARM]

Here is a short video of my bucket system just after I lifted it to drain off the fluid. It also shows a pic of my rain gutter feeder I built...crude but it works! I also tried to picture the nature of their droppings from eating free range forage and this feed. When the other video gets done uploading, I'll post it also. It is of my CX free ranging.

Thanks for sharing that. I really enjoyed watching your Cornish X'a run all over the place. You have a really nice piece of property.
when did you start letting yours forage? Mine are only about 2 weeks old and do not have their feathers yet. But we are in the 80's during the day now here in Texas. I have them right now in my brooder room so guess I need to actually get them something built for outside so they know they are to be in there at night and can be outside during the day when my standards are locked up. I let them all out one pen at a time sense they are my breeders for now. Winter everyone runs together.
Really love your coop you have for them. Can you tell me a little more on how you built it.
deana

 

[shadowmane]

Beekissed, I watched your second video on Youtube. Looks like you have a least a couple of red chickens in and amongst those Cornish X. Are those layers, or are they red meat birds?

 

[brandislee]

I don't know if it would still give the same level of nutrients or even the same kind if the liquid has not been distilled, but I'm wondering if our fermented fluid on these grains would be considered a type of stillage byproduct and have the same benefits?

It's possible. I also didn't mention that I also supplemented them with Brewer's yeast, which is also a good source of niacin. I know that fermentation creates B vitamins, but I don't know which one, and I DO know that at least normally raw ACV doesn't contain niacin. But maybe the bacteria chowing down on the grains creates niacin. It would be awesome to test our mixtures and see!

I've been fermenting my chicks' food for about three days. They're still coming around to it. I haven't totally taken the plunge yet and taken their dry crumbles away. I have an unreasonable fear of them getting too hungry and dying. But I'm extra motivated to ferment now- the day after I started reading this thread one of my chicks went down with what looked like the same thing I had last time (bad legs in very small chicks) and died in a few hours. It was a lot faster and worse, and was likely something else in addition to vitamin deficiency (the last time I only lost one because it couldn't get back to the light and got chilled overnight). But I have two others who seem fine overall, but have toes curled to the side. I noticed it Sunday (the same day I lost the last one) and obviously I immediately started supplementing- polyvisol given directly, chick vites and ACV in the water, and brewer's yeast in their food in addition to the fermented food. But because I'm now worried about these chicks I'm even less excited to take their crumbles away.

And actually my 3, 5, and 6 week old layers are a little more excited about the fermented food than the littler chicks. Since they're big and healthy I'm just going to let their dry food run out and see how they do. I'm happy with the fermented stuff- it smells like it should, sweet and sour, and it's not much more work. I started mixing some grain in it as well, and am still working on my method.