Fermenting Feed for Meat Birds

[Angelicisi]

I sent her a message asking for her to visit here lol

Can someone direct me to Kassaundra's link so I can see how much feed/grains, water, ACV, etc that I need to start off with for the 30 gallon trash can batch?

And how much of all of those would I need for a 5 gallon bucket? How much water? ACV? Feed/grains?

 

[Beekissed]

Can someone direct me to Kassaundra's link so I can see how much feed/grains, water, ACV, etc that I need to start off with for the 30 gallon trash can batch?

And how much of all of those would I need for a 5 gallon bucket? How much water? ACV? Feed/grains?

There really are no specifics on fermented feed, as you will find out. No recipe, no measurements, nothing..it's a fly by the seat of your pants ride into your own, tailored for you and your flock experience. I know this drives type A folks mad, but there it is. What works at one place will not work at another, for a different type of feed, grain, temperature, etc.

Just fill your can or bucket 3/4 of the way with feed(2/3 if using pelleted feeds), add water to about 4-6 in. over that~depending on what type of feed you use...if pellets or crumble, expect some rise and fluff, so allow for it in your bucket/can~and throw in a glug or glorp or two of the ACV. You don't even have to use the ACV if you don't wish but it can help speed things a little. Allow for water absorption and grain swelling in your container and in your water use...you may have to tweak this until you get the hang of it.

In the larger vat-style setups, keeping some water close to the top of the feed, if not always over it, can make it easier to stir and keep all the feed moist. You'll have to play around with it and see what suits you and keep in mind...there just ain't no way to really mess it up unless you kept your mix too dry to stir and get moist all over, which is fixed by simply adding a little more water.

Here are a few pics of my bucket with using different textures/types of feed after the initial absorption of the fluid...if I were doing this in larger containers, I might mix it a little more soupy because I would not be attempting to stir it much.









A vid or two of refreshing a bucket with dry grain and water....

 

[Triple Willow]

My younger group is now 19 weeks. It looks like just in the past couple days some of their combs/wattles have got so much bigger and more red. I smell eggs a coming! hehe My older flock started laying at just a tad over 19 weeks. New egg layers are so exciting! LOL I hope they start before November!

 

[Beekissed]

My heritage line birds are now 6 mo. old and have shown red faces for over a month now...but no eggs. Folks on a thread with the same lines but with older birds (7 mo. old) are saying they still haven't seen any lay yet. That's the trade off with heritage line birds, though....later to mature but longer laying lives. I'm thinking I won't get eggs until maybe December, which is just about the time I'll be needing them when my older layers taper off for a rest.

If I'm still here in the spring, I hope to slowly start replacing this flock of hatchery birds with heritage line stock. I've been so impressed with these 4 heritage stock birds on their dependence on foraged foods and very little consumption of the grain based feed. I'm having a little trouble now getting them to transition over to chicken feed now that it's cold out and no bugs to be found. They still want to forage exclusively and hardly ever make it to the coop for feed time...which is causing them to lose some conditioning right now. Other than penning them up with the flock and making them depend solely on the feeds I provide, I don't know how to get them to switch smoothly over to winter feed conditions. They are so wild I'd hate to pen them for long..they'd be going crazy trying to find the way OUT.

 

[kuntrygirl]

I sent her a message asking for her to visit here lol

Can someone direct me to Kassaundra's link so I can see how much feed/grains, water, ACV, etc that I need to start off with for the 30 gallon trash can batch?

And how much of all of those would I need for a 5 gallon bucket? How much water? ACV? Feed/grains?

Thanks!

 

[kuntrygirl]

Can someone direct me to Kassaundra's link so I can see how much feed/grains, water, ACV, etc that I need to start off with for the 30 gallon trash can batch? And how much of all of those would I need for a 5 gallon bucket? How much water? ACV? Feed/grains?

There really are no specifics on fermented feed, as you will find out. No recipe, no measurements, nothing..it's a fly by the seat of your pants ride into your own, tailored for you and your flock experience. I know this drives type A folks mad, but there it is. What works at one place will not work at another, for a different type of feed, grain, temperature, etc. Just fill your can or bucket 3/4 of the way with feed(2/3 if using pelleted feeds), add water to about 4-6 in. over that~depending on what type of feed you use...if pellets or crumble, expect some rise and fluff, so allow for it in your bucket/can~and throw in a glug or glorp or two of the ACV. You don't even have to use the ACV if you don't wish but it can help speed things a little. Allow for water absorption and grain swelling in your container and in your water use...you may have to tweak this until you get the hang of it. In the larger vat-style setups, keeping some water close to the top of the feed, if not always over it, can make it easier to stir and keep all the feed moist. You'll have to play around with it and see what suits you and keep in mind...there just ain't no way to really mess it up unless you kept your mix too dry to stir and get moist all over, which is fixed by simply adding a little more water. Here are a few pics of my bucket with using different textures/types of feed after the initial absorption of the fluid...if I were doing this in larger containers, I might mix it a little more soupy because I would not be attempting to stir it much. A vid or two of refreshing a bucket with dry grain and water....

Perfect. Great tutorial. This is a great guide. Thanks. I'll start another batch today.

 

[Kassaundra]

Can someone direct me to Kassaundra's link so I can see how much feed/grains, water, ACV, etc that I need to start off with for the 30 gallon trash can batch?

And how much of all of those would I need for a 5 gallon bucket? How much water? ACV? Feed/grains?

Mine is ultra simple. I use grains (oat, wheat, corn, boss) whatever, water from my outdoor hose, a black trash bucket I put on the east side of the coop most of the year and move to the south side in the winter. My scoop is a shovel. I fill the bucket to half or so w/ the grains fill w/ water, add water the next day if needed, I keep a 1 inch or so cap of water over grains. When I get down to about 4ish days left I scoop it out into a 5 gal bucket and add more grain and water to the fermented liquid. I do this b/c they can still have the ferment while the new grains ferment in the barrel. I do not ferment extras, only grain products. The purpose of fermenting is to increase digestibility of grains that aren't easily digested by monogastric animals, this is not a problem for greens, fish, meat, etc...... so don't need the "fix". The more complicated you make the process the more chance of problems. imo

 

[Beekissed]

Exactly...couldn't have said that better myself. The whole idea of FF is to provide better nutrition in a cheap and simple manner, not to complicate it and buy more and more supplements to throw in the bucket.

 

[Triple Willow]

My heritage line birds are now 6 mo. old and have shown red faces for over a month now...but no eggs.  Folks on a thread with the same lines but with older birds (7 mo. old) are saying they still haven't seen any lay yet.  That's the trade off with heritage line birds, though....later to mature but longer laying lives.  I'm thinking I won't get eggs until maybe December, which is just about the time I'll be needing them when my older layers taper off for a rest. 

If I'm still here in the spring, I hope to slowly start replacing this flock of hatchery birds with heritage line stock.  I've been so impressed with these 4 heritage stock birds on their dependence on foraged foods and very little consumption of the grain based feed.  I'm having a little trouble now getting them to transition over to chicken feed now that it's cold out and no bugs to be found.  They still want to forage exclusively and hardly ever make it to the coop for feed time...which is causing them to lose some conditioning right now.  Other than penning them up with the flock and making them depend solely on the feeds I provide, I don't know how to get them to switch smoothly over to winter feed conditions.  They are so wild I'd hate to pen them for long..they'd be going crazy trying to find the way OUT. 

Yeah I know what you mean about if I am here next year. Life can be very unpredictable and sometimes if feels more that way all the time. I hope where ever the future takes me it includes chickens. I would like to trasition over to a heritage flock too. I believe Australorps might be my choice but there are a few other breeds I like too.

 

[TexasLisa]

Hey you guys, don't go without me!!!

Willow, you need to get some Australorps! I have 3 black beauties and they are the best!!

Lisa