Fermenting Feed for Meat Birds

[Triple Willow]

Thank you Triple Willow!  We do have a Gander Mountain and an Academy.  I will make that one of my stops today and see what I can find.  I will let you know if I can work it.  It will be good for a laugh if I can't work it!

Lisa

Don't you love Gander Mountain! I called and asked them if they had the calls and they told me no. I decided to go look for myself and they did have them - hard to find but they were there. I read somewhere that one of those fake owls will attract crows because the crows hate owls and will try to run it off. I wish mine would move closer to the house. I did hear an awful kind of high pitched growling noise one day while I was out. It went on and on then I saw the crows chasing a hawk off. I wish I had seen that fight! It sounded serious! ...and I was a pretty good ways away from it!

 

[TexasLisa]

You know it is funny the way things change. In Indiana I was surrounded by cornfields. I LOVED it. When living there I was chickenless (didn't know any better) and I would chase the crows away from my garden. Living here in Texas, I welcome them. It is just crazy the way your life goes sometimes.

Lisa

 

[foreverlearning]

ok, not sure if this question has been answered here somewhere. I drilled holes in my inner bucket with a 3/32 bit. Not draining well at all... not enough holes? holes clogged up?

Drill some more holes and see if it helps it drain more. I know I had the same problem and just put more holes in it and it started to drain fine

X2. Also if you are doing something like crumbles it helps not to stir for 1/2 an hour before. Mine drains slow but it drains with lots of holes halfway up and on the bottom.

 

[colburg]

ok, not sure if this question has been answered here somewhere. I drilled holes in my inner bucket with a 3/32 bit. Not draining well at all... not enough holes? holes clogged up?

hey fuzz, you can try several things. I found that a 5/32 or 3/16 bit worked just fine, even when fermenting pellets. Also, my buckets have about 150 holes each. They go so fast with a battery drill you won't even know how many you've done if you're not counting.

Something else to try...Don't drain it. You can keep your FF covered with water or not. The consistency can be soupy, oatmealish, thick, thin, or stewlike and the chickens won't care.

The reason I use the 2 bucket method is so that we have some scoby for when we accidentally feed out all the FF, and need some innoculant for the next batch, or when I need to start an additional bucket of FF.

 

[fuzziecreatures]

ok, I don't have entirely enough holes then! Guess I'm gonna have to dump it in another bucket to drill more holes and make the others bigger.
I started a 5 gal bucket last Friday and fed the first time today... small amount of bubbling and still smelled of acv, it hasn't been going over 80 though and I had it in my coop which is actually a concrete block shed that was on the property. I started half of a 55gal plastic food barrel last night though. 1 50# bag feed, 25# whole wheat, BOSS, some buckwheat, water, acv and added some yeast. Actually my husband added the yeast, he said "KISS" and dumped some. Stirred well last night (with a plastic canoe paddle

), covered with an old window screen. Checked it this morning just for giggles.... it was bubbling around the edges!! It looked a little thick so I stirred it again, not too thick and now it's looking wonderful! It was warm in that barrel too.... warmer than outside of the barrel.

 

[foreverlearning]

hey fuzz, you can try several things. I found that a 5/32 or 3/16 bit worked just fine, even when fermenting pellets. Also, my buckets have about 150 holes each. They go so fast with a battery drill you won't even know how many you've done if you're not counting.

Something else to try...Don't drain it. You can keep your FF covered with water or not. The consistency can be soupy, oatmealish, thick, thin, or stewlike and the chickens won't care.

The reason I use the 2 bucket method is so that we have some scoby for when we accidentally feed out all the FF, and need some innoculant for the next batch, or when I need to start an additional bucket of FF.

You counted??? All I could think about was my hurting hand. I should have read a little further before I started mine! I had a 20yr old corded drill with way to long of a drill bit. Next time going to use a smaller drill bit.

ok, I don't have entirely enough holes then! Guess I'm gonna have to dump it in another bucket to drill more holes and make the others bigger.
I started a 5 gal bucket last Friday and fed the first time today... small amount of bubbling and still smelled of acv, it hasn't been going over 80 though and I had it in my coop which is actually a concrete block shed that was on the property. I started half of a 55gal plastic food barrel last night though. 1 50# bag feed, 25# whole wheat, BOSS, some buckwheat, water, acv and added some yeast. Actually my husband added the yeast, he said "KISS" and dumped some. Stirred well last night (with a plastic canoe paddle

), covered with an old window screen. Checked it this morning just for giggles.... it was bubbling around the edges!! It looked a little thick so I stirred it again, not too thick and now it's looking wonderful! It was warm in that barrel too.... warmer than outside of the barrel.

Just remember to stir both everyday, I have read a lot of posts where people forgot to stir every day and it "spoiled". Good luck!

 

[Demosthine]

You have to give them a pep talk every day and be sure to say "thank you" like a good chicken hugger should! LOL I freaked them all out with a fresh bag of shavings tonight. The eggs may come pre-scrambled tomorrow. LOL

Do you ever freeze extra eggs to use later on? I have read about that, may have to try it someday. What breed do you have?

I haven't had enough extras to start freezing. When we do, they'll just go on a shelf under our stair well. I cut out the wall to the coat closet so that we could use the rest as storage. It's getting pretty full of food supplies. We started everyone off small, as really small chicks, so a majority of the clan isn't laying yet. Until recently, we only had three hens laying. We just had another one, maybe two start recently, but those have been sporadic the last week or two. Other than that, I have three that are very near laying and three that are several months away still.

What do we have? A bunch... I have three Broad Breasted Bronze turkeys, one Black Copper Marans cockerel and two hens (one is laying, one might be), one New Hampshire cockerel with two non-layering pullets, a useless Silkie cockerel and one non-laying nearly year old pullet, two laying Barred Rocks, a laying Birchen Marans, and three non-laying Ameraucanas. We very recently acquired and bred two rabbits that will be producing feeder rabbits, and a "partridge in a pear tree..."

The Silkies bug the daylights out of me. They are ugly as heck, and at 48 weeks old, she isn't even laying. Neither of those would be around if they weren't my wife's little mutts.

 

[Demosthine]

What did we do before the internut? lol

They went out every day to collect and use the fresh eggs, milk the cows and allow the cream to separate overnight. The next day they made fresh butter, yogurt and sour cream with it, or used the churned cream (aka buttermilk) to make fresh, hot biscuits for breakfast. They picked the fresh fruit and vegetables from the gardens every afternoon for dinner. And then they still had time to sit down for some good ol' fashioned family time in front of the dial radio...

Oh, to be able to go back to that lifestyle without working my life away just to own an average sized house...

 

[PetRock]

Hi Lisa. I got mine at Gander Mountain for about $10. But they are harder to operate than you'd think. I've got to learn how to use it! This guy on this video is pretty dang good at using one.

Thank you for posting this link! I love the video! We have quite a few crows around here and I have watched them drive off hawks. I may need to order one of these to play with!

 

[Beekissed]

They went out every day to collect and use the fresh eggs, milk the cows and allow the cream to separate overnight. The next day they made fresh butter, yogurt and sour cream with it, or used the churned cream (aka buttermilk) to make fresh, hot biscuits for breakfast. They picked the fresh fruit and vegetables from the gardens every afternoon for dinner. And then they still had time to sit down for some good ol' fashioned family time in front of the dial radio...

Oh, to be able to go back to that lifestyle without working my life away just to own an average sized house...

Exactly. We worked and there was no sitting around time...and it was great! Back when we were doing it, Mother Earth News was a REAL magazine with articles on self sufficient lifestyles that didn't cost a bundle...all were homemade and innovative solutions. I was in grade school, but still perused our collection of MEN mags and Firefox books, that were a rich source of information~but even richer was going out to grandma's house~ no internet needed. Things passed down through the generations was useful information..and, funny enough, are treated like a new discovery now.