Fermenting Feed for Meat Birds

[Triple Willow]

I've got 4 parts duck grower (18% - have call ducks too) to 1 part scratch. Have 15% grower dry ration as free fed between FF feedings. I have a mixed age flock (from 12 weeks to over 3 years old) so I'm hoping this is all a good balance for them. Its interesting to see what other recipes folks have for their birds too.

Good luck with the diet. I just have to cut out most breads & sugar, then the weight falls off. Hardest part is getting started when you've stopped though.

Thanks. I wish my weight would fall off! lol I'm not a big bread eater so I can't cut that too much. Sugar, I don't eat a whole lot of it but more than I should. Yeah, some bad joint pain has gave me all the motivation I needed to get serious about it. I'm about 30lbs down from the highest I've ever been but I still want to lose a lot more. Slowly but surely - I hope!

 

[RoseMarie1]

Oh Bee I bet they'll come around to ff once they realize that's their only food source until spring time. Mine aren't wanting to eat their ff right now much either. They'd rather be out foraging. It's even hard to get IN the pen to give food without some coming out the door!

They dearly LOVE foraging although I'm still having fits keeping them off my carport and patio because it contains a lot of food for them as in spiders and dropped cat food from the cats as well as hubby tossing out stuff for the cats. lol the chickens will attack the cats over the stuff. lol Hubby was sitting out there on the patio at the table this evening and he was peeling a pear and one of the rir hens jumps up on the table after his pear. lol He shoved her off the table telling her to get down. He tossed them the peelings.

 

[Beekissed]

I've noticed Toby roosting a little closer to one of my young WRs...each night he gets a little closer and I've seen them roosting side by side. In the past I've noticed that older, less fertile hens will get the shove to lower or lesser roosting as younger gals come to sexual maturity. It's a slow and gradual thing but if you know where everyone normally roosts and when they normally roost together, you get to learn a thing or two as the years go by. I'm thinking that little girl will be my first layer of the Honey Suckle Gang...she's my largest WR of the two heritage line birds. Her name is Hope and I'm hope-ing she is going to be my next Big Bertha of the coop.

The more she sexually matures, the closer she will stay to that rooster, which means when tubby Toby runs to the coop for breakfast, Hope will start acting more like part of the flock and follow where he leads. I'll be watching for this development in the Chicken Coop Chronicles. Until then, they are just going to be skinny until they learn to come when they are called...

 

[Triple Willow]

...just like a man. lol

 

[Beekissed]

That's exactly what I thought the first time I noticed it happening!

In Toby's case, there's no fool like an old fool.....

 

[Beekissed]

Here's a cautionary tale of trying to attempt an anaerobic system for fermentation. I'd like to point out that there seems to be some misunderstanding out there about what exactly happens with anaerobic metabolism during fermentation, as I have read from others about this very thing on this thread and it's from that misunderstanding whence comes the insistence that the FF must be kept under water in order for fermentation to take place.

from within the input material. When the oxygen source in an anaerobic system is derived from the organic material itself, then the 'intermediate' end products are primarily alcohols, aldehydes, and organic acids plus carbon dioxide. In the presence of specialised methanogens, the intermediates are converted to the 'final' end products of methane, carbon dioxide with trace levels of hydrogen sulfide.[2] In an anaerobic system the majority of the chemical energy contained within the starting material is released by methanogenic bacteria as methane.[3]

Water over the feed, lid on the feed, anaerobic systems to keep out oxygen....mean nothing to the fermentation of the feeds except trapping the carbon dioxide and/or methane and making for a dangerous situation, such as at farms when silage is being made. Good ventilation is recommended for this type of fermentation.

Please, please...if you encounter anyone else trying to over think the fermentation of feeds by claiming it's an anaerobic process so it must be covered by water or closed tightly into a container, inform them of the correct information about anaerobes and their relationship to fermentation of cereal grains. When I run onto a blog site that tries to complicate this simple process, I take the time to inform them their information may need reviewing. Two different blogs I have informed of this~one of which was the blog site visited by this member~did nothing to correct the information being detailed in their site on this matter when informed.

The member for whom the jar exploded informed the blog site of this mishap and they stated they would go back through their blog site and correct this misinformation. It remains to be seen if this will actually happen, so please help people who come here carrying these misconceptions along, by providing them with more accurate information when you can.

 

[mlowen]

I remember reading cautions on all the threads I subscribe to about the need for fermented feed to "off gas" and to not put lids on tightly, even when covering the feed with water. Submerging the feed is one of the ways to ferment and is not inherently wrong, just one of the many ways. Tight lids are a bad idea, whether the feed is submerged in water or oatmeal consistency. I put a pillow case over my bucket & it works great for off gassing and keeping the dog out of it. (No, he is NOT very food-driven!

)

 

[Shellz]

Good point! The anaerobic method is what I'm using. I'm well aware of what can happen, so my feed is covered with an over-sized lid. Working great now for about 2 weeks.

 

[Angelicisi]

I know its frustrating Bee- but keep the info flowing to others! I was on a forum (not byc- I know I know) that got into FF feed and they were so lost I just bowed out of the convo because the simpler I tried to make the more intense they got with mis information. You have great info! Keep sharing so when the google for answers they get the right info from you and not some random junk. Harder to unteach bad habits/bad information than it is to show a fresh willing mind


A lid over feed Fermented Feed is ok but never sealed, needs to Breathe! Any containers used will rupture from pressure with secured sealed lids.


My first batch was in a gallon bucket in a shed. I snap half the lid on and leave the other half just sitting. So it can breathe but nothin falls in. Hubby doing chores saw the bucket of my ff feed wasn't closed. He has made alcohol in the past in Sealed containers, so fermented feed project sounded to him like making simple wines...he snapped the lid on the bucket closed thinking I left it open on accident.

In bed that night he tells me, "honey-i closed your feed bucket, you have to hear the snap sound to make sure its sealed...".I was already on my feet, grabbing my robe. Bubbling bucket of feed in closed container makes pressure I say running down the stairs.
I get out there and my gallon bucket of feed is gone. There was a splatter of mush and pieces of bucket lodged into the wood wall if the shed. Was less than 12 hours from seal it exploded.

It bubbling, releasing air and breathing so to speak means you have great stuff going on, but never keep it from breathing. The feed exhaled those bubbles you see, when it runs out of air it chokes, pressure build time depends on how healthy your feed is bubbling and container size, will rupture its container to breathe.
Don't risk sealing and unsealing on a timed schedule, Crap happens in life and one may forget or have somethin come up to keep from burping ff and boom.
I still use snap buckets because they're Hard to seal. A suction of the lid slipping into place won't happen with them.
And I now have a piece of masking tape with bold instructions to not seal lid in case someone else wants to assist or watches the farm (hahahaha like that would happen-this is our vacation)

[COLOR=006400]Here's a cautionary tale of trying to attempt an anaerobic system for fermentation.  I'd like to point out that there seems to be some misunderstanding out there about what exactly happens with anaerobic metabolism during fermentation, as I have read from others about this very thing on this thread and it's from that misunderstanding whence comes the insistence that the FF must be kept under water in order for fermentation to take place.[/COLOR]


[COLOR=006400]This could have been dangerous if someone were standing nearby when this jar exploded, so it bears repeating on this thread about what can happen if correct ventilation during the fermentation is not maintained.  The member who posted this on the other FF thread gave me permission to detail her episode here on this thread so that others may learn and avoid this misconception of how to ferment feed.  [/COLOR]

[COLOR=006400]Here is my reply to that post:[/COLOR]

[COLOR=006400] [/COLOR]
[COLOR=006400]Please, please...if you encounter anyone else trying to over think the fermentation of feeds by claiming it's an anaerobic process so it must be covered by water or closed tightly into a container, inform them of the correct information about anaerobes and their relationship to fermentation of cereal grains.  When I run onto a blog site that tries to complicate this simple process, I take the time to inform them their information may need reviewing.  Two different blogs I have informed of this~one of which was the blog site visited by this member~did nothing to correct the information being detailed in their site on this matter when informed.[/COLOR]

[COLOR=006400]The member for whom the jar exploded informed the blog site of this mishap and they stated they would go back through their blog site and correct this misinformation.  It remains to be seen if this will actually happen, so please help people who come here carrying these misconceptions along, by providing them with more accurate information when you can.    [/COLOR]

 

[3 NH reds]

I have never worried about covering it in over 2 years. I still make mine outside in the open air in the two bucket set up and use the old liquid to start the next batch. My Free range rooster is finally getting some size, he goes to the bucket and helps himself here and there. He is free because he was to small to process because he was the low bird and afraid to eat. Got my new chicks on ACV water and will start a batch of mash for them soon. I never have had poopy butt chicks when they get ACV in the water.