Give flock milk to drink

[mulia24]

then, is that safe to let the flock drink them? that skimmed milk.

honestly i don't know the meaning/form/shape of buttermilk. can anyone let me know what's that and what's that use for? perhaps margarine?

thank you so much.

 

[Chris09]

Info. found on ( http://www.exoticpetvet.net/avian/20facts.html )

If you think about it, this makes sense. Mammals are nourished during infancy with their mother's milk. Birds would never be in a situation in the wild where they would drink milk. For this reason, birds do not possess the digestive enzymes necessary to process milk. Parent birds regurgitate food to their babies in the nest. Although you might have heard about pigeons feeding their babies crop milk, this is actually sloughed cells from the crop and secretions, and not a milk product at all.

Milk sugar is called lactose. Mammals have a digestive enzyme, lactase, to digest milk sugar. Birds simply lack lactase and cannot digest milk products containing lactose. Birds will develop diarrhea when lactose in the diet reaches between 10 and 30 percent. Products that contain a significant amount of lactose are dried skim milk and dried whey. Humans may also suffer from an inability to digest lactose, and this is called lactose intolerance.

Some milk products contain little or no lactose, and these may be safely fed to birds. And actually, these products (cheese and yogurt) are a good source of calcium for birds. Some owners have asked me if they can feed birds items containing lactose if they also give them one of those products for humans (such as Lactaid) to aid in the digestion of milk sugar. Unfortunately, that is also dangerous, as one of the by-products of lactose digestion is galactose, which is also toxic to birds. So these products must never be used in birds.

Chris

 

[digitS']

Mulia, you may be able to culture canned milk by just letting it sit at room temperature for several hours. A problem with that is that your milk has been cooked and so it has no bacteria in it. Perhaps, an unsafe bacteria could get started in the milk and make it dangerous for the chickens.

Cheese is made with safe bacteria. You could probably "start" the culture with a piece of cheese. Even just a few grams of cheese would probably be all that is needed for a jar of milk. Cover the jar with a clean cloth.

When that milk begins to smell like cheese, it probably is safe to give to the chickens. You can keep a little of it in the jar and refill the jar with more canned milk. Every few days, you'd probably better put your culture in a new, clean jar with a clean cloth to cover.

Milk like this has been used to feed chickens for 100's of years in this country. Since a farmer would be using fresh milk from the cows, the milk would have naturally-occurring bacteria already in it. Your canned milk is different so we can't really be sure how it would work for you and you don't have cultured yogurt or buttermilk available. A piece of cheese is just my best guess as to what you could use to start your culture.

Steve

 

[Big dreams]

Muila, just wondering and excuse my ignorance but can you grow grass? greens? or anything and if not why not? Maybe you could plant in the chicken pen and keep chickens off until it is bigger then let them eat it, or have some for you too.

 

[mulia24]

ups, thanks chris, maybe it's not safe to fed them milk.

thanks steve, so mixing skimmed milk with warm water and just add a piece of cheese and let it start *fermentation* . is that like that? and that's safe for the flock to drink it? that's really big problem to find other think like buttermilk, hard to find thing here. and is that enough protein and calcium inside a cup of milk for them?

so, grow just grass and when big enough fed them? is that enough to eat grass to fulfill protein and calcium for them? i can't grow another green here, very unwide land i have only.


thank you for keep helping me to provide my flock good supply of mineral they need by give me many suggestion

 

[muell112]

Personally, I would grow Kale. Here's a quote from that website I posted earlier - the numbers below are milligrams of calcium per 8oz:

"Many dark green leafy vegetables have relatively high calcium concentrations. The calcium in spinach is however, somewhat poorly absorbed, probably because of the high concentration of oxalate. The study revealed that kale, a low-oxalate vegetable, is a good source of bio-available calcium. Kale is a member of the same family that includes broccoli, turnip greens, collard greens and mustard greens. These low-oxalate, calcium-rich vegetables are therefore also likely to be better sources of available calcium

cooked turnip greens 450
cooked bok choy 330
cooked collards 300
cooked spinach 250
cooked kale 200
parsley 200
cooked mustard greens 180
dandelion greens 150
romaine lettuce 40
head lettuce 10

 

[mulia24]

thank you muell, by the way, what's kale?

and how about the protein concentration.

could i give peanut to chicken? peanut is very easy to gain here.

thank you.

 

[Big dreams]

Yes, I was just wondering if it were possible to grow anything, if so, it would be a good idea.

 

[possumqueen]

mulia,

if you have beans or peas you can sprout them! they would be good for the chickens, and they would be very good for you!

soak the beans or peas in a jar of clean water for 24 hours, then rinse them gently, cover the jar with cloth, and set it in a warm place for another 24 or 48 hours. The seeds will sprout and grow maybe 2 or 3 inches tall. Then rinse them again and eat them as they are, or feed them to your chickens.

They are full of protein, and quite tasty!

 

[muell112]

kale is a lettuce-type plant. Have you seen collard greens before? You can probably google images "kale" and see what it looks like. If you're looking for calcium and a plant you can grow to give your chickens a good source of calcium I think this one would be the way to go because it's easily absorbed from this plant. And they are full of other nutrients too. I don't know about peanuts as far as being beneficial for a calcium supplement. I do know they are high in fat which may not be what you're looking for.