Growing Feed

[rmonge00]

Is anyone growing a large portion of their own feed? I would to find a way to become a bit more independent from the feed companies (plus save some money!) Beans, corn, what are you growing for them and how do you moderat their feed?

Thanks!!

Ryan

 

[cubalaya]

ours get the waste from the garden. they free range some of the time. we have planted sunflowers and millet just for our animals and will plant turnips and mangel beets later on. we still use commercial layer and medicated chick starter but this saves money.

 

[rmonge00]

Nice

How much are you growing and how do you store it?

 

[4sillychickens]

I was wondering the same thing. We can't let the chickens free range where we live, so I give them lots of garden scraps. But I want to know what are good plants that I can grow and then store for the winter. I'm know dried corn and sunflowers are good. But what else?

 

[TheBirdiesAreMyBabies777]

Currently we are trying to grow wheat, millet, oats, barley, and rye in small strips so we can have extra feed for the winter and also material for fresh breads.

(We have Chickens, Ducks, Guineas, & Geese.) We've also considered growing milo/sorghum because the guineas really seem to like it in their scratch grains. However, due to the fact that the sorghum seed is treated, we are having an interesting time trying to find the safest and best place to plant it. Storing the grain will also be an interesting task, but it'll be worth all the work. Plus it'll make the birds happy and save money!

 

[jaketheeggman]

This sounds awesome!!!!

What would be something easy (low maintenance) to grow in my yard in Wisconsin? I do have some space because i have 3 acres but do not want to take up to big of an area.

Thanks
Jake

 

[4sillychickens]

Wheat is very low maintenance

I planted some winter wheat last fall and haven't touched it since and it looks great. I don't really know how wheat grows in WI. What I did was look up what kind of wheat grows in the PacificNW and that's what I planted.

 

[Jeffross1968]

I would look into comfrey. It's discussed here... and other places around the web. Very high in protein, so very good free range food.

 

[4sillychickens]

Quote:
Very informative link! Thanks!

 

[Jeffross1968]

You're welcome! We actually bought a few brown leghorns from a guy a few weeks ago, who also farms and sells comfrey. His birds free range on the stuff all day. Some will eat it right off the plant, but they prefer to have it ripped off for them, and then allowed to wilt. He gave us about 10 roots, which is how he sells it, which we have planted and is now growing around the house. Not really big enough yet to do anything with, but relatively soon we'll be using it to feed them. Supposedly very hardy and grows like crazy with little attention once started. Higher protein level than any other plant, I believe.