Growing fodder for chickens

[Clovischickens]

Have you ever used triticale so or rye? My girls ignore these grains when I ferment them so thought I would use to sprout. Thanks

 

[cmelvin]

What about fodder/sprouts for young chicks? Anyone try that? What age were the chicks? Mine are only a week old.

 

[michaelf]

What about fodder/sprouts for young chicks? Anyone try that? What age were the chicks? Mine are only a week old.

I let my chickens out to free range and the chicks eat all the tender grass and weed spouts . So I would say yes they can eat it!

 

[CATRYNA]

The youngest chicks we have right now are a week old, hatched by one of our hens who went broody. They are eating meal worms, Sesame seeds, Flax seeds, short Wheat/Barley fodder and rmung sprouts along with organic commercial chick feed. They also nibble on the mustard
mustard greens that grow on our property. Here's a pic. I wasn't able to upload a video.

 

[Smiling Angel]

Hi, I hope some of you can help me clear something up. I've been reading about the folks who feed only fodder to their flocks. So far, we are feeding our 5 hens mainly organic laying pellets, and have been since last summer (they are now a year old). I have purchased wheat and barley seeds for sprouting and have devised my own little system to grow a couple of 6 X12 trays at a time for our girls. My daughter-in-law (we live in the same house) read somewhere that they shouldn't get the sprouts too often, as it can cause diarrhea. I been researching this, but can't find reference to this anywhere. My idea had been to give them a small patch (like 6" X 4") every day or so.

Can you help clear this up for me?

One more question...How can I keep the fodder from going bad if I have too much at any given time? Can I store it in the fridge?

Thanks

 

[CATRYNA]

Smiling Angel... By all means you can store the fodder in the fridge. But, it might be easier to stagger how much you grow at any given time. We have about 20 hens who are laying right now, 10 teenagers and around 15 chicks. They all get fodder along with meal worms; the adults and teenagers also get mustard weeds or any other edible weeds we pull on our property, laying mash and a variety of seeds. The young ones get a grow mash along with fodder, (about 1inch high) variety of sprouts, variety of seeds. Several times a week they all get copious amounts of fermented raw milk/yogurt/kefir. Hope this helps. Oh yes, one more thing; when we find that we have too much fodder, we juice it for ourselves.

 

[Smiling Angel]

Catryna - thank you so much for your prompt reply. So, I guess you are saying that daily fodder is not bad for the chickens? My daughter-in-law is convinced that the fodder will give our girls diarrhea. I guess she just min-inperpreted what she read somewhere? Yes, I do need to stagger the amount that I grow so as to not have to much at any given time, and I plan to. It's just this first batch that is more than I can feed them all at once. I'm learning...it's a trial and error type of thing, I guess!

 

[Sirracha]

I

Smiling Angel... By all means you can store the fodder in the fridge. But, it might be easier to stagger how much you grow at any given time. We have about 20 hens who are laying right now, 10 teenagers and around 15 chicks. They all get fodder along with meal worms; the adults and teenagers also get mustard weeds or any other edible weeds we pull on our property, laying mash and a variety of seeds. The young ones get a grow mash along with fodder, (about 1inch high) variety of sprouts, variety of seeds. Several times a week they all get copious amounts of fermented raw milk/yogurt/kefir.  Hope this helps.  Oh yes, one more thing; when we find that we have too much fodder, we juice it for ourselves.

i too got on the bandwagon and bought a manual juicer for the fodder.

 

[CATRYNA]

Smiling Angel You are very welcome. It's all an experiment in the beginning.

Like anything introduced we always want to go easy as new things can cause diarrhea or even constipation. But, most chickens are very hardy and adapt very quickly to new foods. Good luck to you and have fun; we sure do and hope you will too.

 

[Weezy Laken]

I have one of those plastic bins you get at the hospital to wash up in. I put dirt and then Oat seeds in and mixed that around. once they sprouted and were about 6"s to a foot tall I took it out to the coop this past winter and they loved it. they loved to get in the dirt and take a bath as well. had fresh greens about every other week.