Fermenting Feed for Meat Birds

[perchie.girl]

Quote:

It will ferment well clear down to 50*, just have to mix larger batches then so that it has more time to ferment the grains. I just moved to a larger batch mix as we have been having temps into the 40s at night and mine is in the coop. Someone suggested a heated water bucket the other day so one could keep it outside and I think that is an excellent idea...and will be following through on that suggestion. No more toting feed from the house in the winter months.

No such thing as toooo hot for FF. I've had mine in my non-insulated shop for over year now. Includes temps from nightly low of 10F up to a high of 115F. In the winter, I'll ferment in 2 buckets so that they get about 48hrs of fermenting. I had ice on the rim of the buckets one morning and the days may or may not have gotten above freezing, can't remember, but after 48 hrs, I gaurantee it was fermented. In the summer, I only use 1 bucket that I add food and water to daily, and 16-24 hrs is all it needs. It smells stronger in the summer....Not bad, just stronger.

No need to keep anything in the house unless it gets too cold.

Cheers,

This is good..... I have a room I call the greenhouse room. Because when I bought the house it was a greenhouse..... Built on the south side of the house.... first year there it reached temperatures of 140 in there..... I had the glass removed and a roof put on a twelve by six opening was left for eventual installation of some french doors. Its covered with a chainlink gate right now. Inside the room is very comfortable. It has water and drains too. and a concrete floor. I will do the fermenting in there. at first.

Can it go longer than 48 hours? in a pinch.

deb

 

[perchie.girl]

I'm lazy so I would want flowers that would come back every year. lol I like Marigolds a lot and Petunias. Mimosa trees are pretty but they can become a problem with sprouts coming up EVERYWHERE even long after the tree is gone. I cut a big Mimosa limb the other day and put it in the bird's run. They stripped every little leaf off of it, hundreds and hundreds of them ...so Mimosa won't kill chickens. lol Goats love Mimosa!

I was thinking the other day, if your going to have trees and bushes in the yard why not make a lot of them fruit trees and fruit bushes/vines. Not only would they be there for years and years to come, they would be a source of food and maybe even a source of income. I have also seen fruit trees be one of the selling points of a property.

Elderberry (VERY good for your health)
Granny Smith Apples (I love!)
Pear
Peach
Cherry
Paw Paw Tree
Blackberries
Blueberries
(Many more to choose from...)

I have wild Elderberry bushes near the house. Here they only get about ten feet tall. You can make wine from them if so inclined....VBG

We dont get enough of a freeze for many apples but I could plant one or two apple trees. We get about a weeks worth of snow one day at a time through the winter and maybe one hard frost. But most winters day time temps are high forties and fifties night time temps are below freezing.

IF I could provide water for them I would plant:
Lemons
Limes
Cumquats
Cold hardy Tangerines
Cold hardy Oranges
These would be planted around my courtyard and Espaliered to create a living extension to the fence.

For what its worth if you dont have the space you can take a base root Like lemon and graft on other Citrus so technically you could have a Lemon tree with orange, lime, cumquats, Tangarines, and oranges on it.... eventually. My Great Grandma on my moms side was quite gifted with citrus.

You can do the same with stone fruit trees, or apples with pears..... And especially helpful if you need two trees to cross polinate for fruit. Like Cherries.

By espaliering them you keep the size down and spread the branches out with support giving sunlight to all portions of the tree and allowing it to produce more fruit.

The other trees/bushes i would plant would be Natal plum which is a natural thorny hedge that produces fruit. though i dont know how cold hardy it is I have to look that up.

so.... If I can find varieties that will live in my zone and temps
Natal plum
fig
peaches
apricots

apples
Prickley pear cactus you can eat the fruit.
Nopal cactus... you can eat the cactus

ANY kind of vegetables here have to be grown in a raised bed that has hardware cloth on the bottom and a cage of some sort over the top. its a race to protect grown food from:
Jackrabbit
Cotton tails
Bush rabbits... smaller than cotton tails
Kangaroo rats
desert mice
church mice
voles
gophers
deer
chipmunks
Ground squirrels.... Very destructive.
They are all first attracted by the water then take advantage of any greenstuff around.

BTW rosemary grows here without additional water once its established.

deb

 

[waltandlori]

He Walt are you my brother?..... LOL....  I take it they are young..... have they been de horned?  If not you have to be careful they cant get their head through a fence or small space or they will get caught.  Oh and Hot wire is your friend....  For Goat Containment....

deb

They still have horns. They are in a fenced area 30x50, they don't seem able to get out. Their house and climbing stuff is smack in the middle. They won't be dinner as they are "my wife's and granddaughter. I'm just the caretaker lol. They are ok 2 are friendly and 2 are skittish. I think the meatys have more eat on them.
Walt

 

[wlhtx]

They are in a fenced area 30x50, they don't seem able to get out.

What you mean is: "For now they don't WANT to get out."

If I were a betting woman, I would wager that they can and will get out when it suits their pleasure. There's not an un-electrified fence in the world that can keep these buggers IN if they want OUT. Trust me.

And when they do decide that they want out, watch your cars. Goats like to tap dance, and they prefer to be on stage when they do it. Vehicles make excellent stages for tap dancing goats. Ask me how I know.

 

[colburg]

This is good..... I have a room I call the greenhouse room. Because when I bought the house it was a greenhouse..... Built on the south side of the house.... first year there it reached temperatures of 140 in there..... I had the glass removed and a roof put on a twelve by six opening was left for eventual installation of some french doors. Its covered with a chainlink gate right now. Inside the room is very comfortable. It has water and drains too. and a concrete floor. I will do the fermenting in there. at first.

Can it go longer than 48 hours? in a pinch.

deb

I have left mine untouched for up to 5 days(I think, could have been 4...maybe 7). It'll have a dry crust on it and tons of gnats, but that's ok. I just scoop and feed it like normal.

The water and drains will come in handy, or at least for me they would. I occasionally overestimate the amount of food and/or water I need to add and the feed will swell and push water out of the bucket. Doesn't harm anything, just a mess to clean.

A few notes on my FF process: I was thinking about getting some pics and doing a small writeup on it, but keep forgetting the pics.
I used to keep mine covered with water, but decided to try it drier several months ago.
Water hasn't covered my FF for months now.
I very rarely stir it anymore. Not when it's mixed, or before I feed, or if it sits for 3 or 4 or 7 days.
There is no cover for it. Not a lid, a sheet, or a towel. Though I could see where you might want one if it was near your house, or if the chickens had access to your bucket.
I haven't added ACV or had to start over since I started...over a year ago.
Using the 2 bucket method keeps an extremely rich scoby in the bottom bucket.
I've scooped as little as a pint of scoby out of the bottom to innoculate a 2nd batch of FF. The 2nd bucket of FF will be completely fermented in about 24hrs(temperature permitting).
If the FF is too wet or too dry, it gets served without straining or adding more water. Those chickens will eat it no matter the consistency.

The short of it is:
Does stirring matter? NOPE
Does consistency matter? NOPE
Does letting it sit too long matter? Probably eventually, but I haven't found that limit yet.

That's it. There's no reason for anyone to not try it.

Cheers,

 

[Triple Willow]

TW; Most of the plants on my list will come back every year. The problem I have is I actually need more TOXIC plants in the mix. The reason being, there's a posse of four or five buck deer and their three does in the area and they strip everything to the ground. Not to mention the dozens of rabbits and the billions of chipmunks and birds... I need things that aren't very palatable to most animals, that won't encourage them to come a-raiding when there's daylilies and fresh grass and strawberries and trees just across the street.... I want the native animals to start nibbling on the wrong thing and think better of ever coming back to my lawn if I can help it! And then sneak in the sweet things between all the ones they don't want.

Wow! I guess the lack of dogs present 24/7 has made those critters feel safe to come in your yard. I have rabbits and squirrels that hang out here and the occassional possum that passes through. My dogs can't seem to run them off. lol Lots of other creatures are out there but keep their distance from the house, as far as I know. I have no idea how well it works but I have read about different things keeping deer away. I believe one was Ivory soap - shaved off or bars hung around here and there. I'm not sure if it was for deer but one thing was to take the hair out of your hairbrush and spread it around your garden. I'm sure there are ofther gimmics to deter them.

 

[perchie.girl]

Quote:
Mine initially were in a quarter acre yard fenced with field fence. Four foot high with T posts and two gates. Mine are Nigerian Dwarfs and one Pygmy. Their shelter was half of the old chicken coop....

When I would leave for errands they would be happily wandering about the yard.... The first month or so..... Then one day I left to go pick something up at the store and something in my rear view mirror caught my eye. GOATS..... They were galloping to follow the car..... Maaa Maaaa Maaa.... where you goin.... LOL.

Turned around drove back and to a one they leaped over the gate perching on top just long enough to see what was on the other side. So.... The fence was old and the gate presented something they could launch off of.... I give you that.

Then I built them their own yard about fifty by eighteen.... With new five foot field fence and new posts and a Dog kennel panel with a gate in it for a gate. That lasted all of a year.

I guess what I am saying is Goat containment is easiest if there is hot wire involved. Once bitten they will leave it alone. They go down on one shoulder and rub along the fence to scratch. I have four twelve foot dog kennel panels that now have "Goat Doors" in them where they broke the attachment at the bottom....

The ideal fence for goats should have a rub bar at the bottom Wire for the rest that is very well stretched or Cattle panels. Having wire at the top doesnt give them a visual on how high to jump or climb.... though Picket fencing works if its built well because they cant climb it too easily.

If I had a Tractor Supply anywhere near me my yard would be fenced with Cattle panels. Unfortunately Hot wire works poorly here.... too dry. I would have to either run bipolar tape or two strands one for hot one for ground along the fence.

deb

 

[perchie.girl]

Quote:
Yep.... LOL.... I know of an antique roadster with a rag top that has a goat sized hole in it.... Happened about 45 years ago.

 

[wlhtx]

I literally had to file an insurance claim in order to fix the numerous hoof marks on my black car. I'll never forget the agent that inspected the damage: "I'm sorry, ma'am, did you just say that GOATS did this?... Were they wild goats?"

Wild goats? No, you idiot. These are goats that I bought and paid for. Why? Because apparently I'm an idiot too.

 

[waltandlori]

I literally had to file an insurance claim in order to fix the numerous hoof marks on my black car. I'll never forget the agent that inspected the damage: "I'm sorry, ma'am, did you just say that GOATS did this?... Were they wild goats?"

Wild goats? No, you idiot. These are goats that I bought and paid for. Why? Because apparently I'm an idiot too.

HERE HERE!!!!!

GOOD ONE!

Walt

(talking to the cute goatie) who's the cutie who's the cutie OW! Who's the idiot lol