Guess what season it is in the Northern Hemisphere?! - Its FODDER Season! 🍀

[alwaysthere4chickens]

Will chickens eat the roots of the fodder?

 

[ChocolateMouse]

Will chickens eat the roots of the fodder?

Yes, though they can be picky sometimes.

 

[gtaus]

Will chickens eat the roots of the fodder?

My chickens absolutely love the root mat of the fodder. Some of my chickens immediately go for the roots, whereas other chickens prefer the greens. In any case, the fodder does not last very long with my girls.

 

[gtaus]

@WannaBeHillBilly, just wanted to give an update on my current fodder situation. I switched over to growing barley seed about a week ago. I decided to use the old barley seed I had left over from last winter. Unfortunately, my germination rate with the old seed is only about 2% - compared with about 95% last year when the seed was fresh. So, evidently, there is a shelf life on barley seed if you plan to use it for fodder. I will be mixing the remaining old barley seed in with my chicken scratch. I plan on going to town this coming week and picking up a fresh bag of barley and restarting my fodder project.

Although my old barley seed did not germinate and grow into beautiful fodder, it also has zero mold in the bins, so I will be feeding all the non-germinated barley seeds to the chickens - no waste. This spring I will taking any left over barley seed and just immediately mixing it in with the chicken scratch. I guess I found out that it was no use to store barley seed for fodder the next year. It just does not germinate when old.

 

[gtaus]

I thought I would post an update on the chia sprout experiment.

It didn't work at all. They turned into blob of goo, some sort of sprouted, and some just rotted and stank. So I asked my friend Google.

Remember the Ch-ch-ch-chia pets? They were probably made out of terra cotta. A couple of websites said to put the seeds in a terra cotta plate, like a plant pot bottom, but without the hole. Soak that, and it absorbs water. Keep it moist -- sitting in a shallow pan with 1/4" water, or spray it several times a day.

I'm gonna try that. We'll see.

I think any seeds used for sprouts or fodder need good drainage. If you let any seed(s) soak in water, they just turn to mush. I bet it smelled pretty bad. In my experience, growing fodder, even in the house, should not really smell bad. The seeds need time to drain and somewhat dry out. If I smell anything bad with my fodder, I know something went wrong and I need to adjust my approach. My initial wheat fodder this fall had some bad mold - and it smelled. I then started using a little bit of bleach in the initial soaking and follow up with some bleach in the water flooding twice a day. That knocked down the mold, and the smell.

Last year I had great success with barley fodder grown in the house. In my case, I learned that it was best to let the water drain immediately down the bathtub drain and not have any standing fodder water in bins. I was able to do that by putting my fodder tower directly in my second bathroom's bathtub/shower. Otherwise, I would have collected the water in a bin on the floor underneath the fodder tower and dumped it after the watering. Sitting water used for the fodder can start to smell - even overnight.

 

[Sally PB]

One of the problems with chia that I didn't have with alfalfa is the gel. Chia are mucilaginous, and that goo is what started to rot and smell. It actually didn't smell too bad, just a "oops, this isn't any good anymore" kind of smell.

I started the chia on a terra cotta dish, so we'll see how it goes, and I will report back.

I would LOVE to make a fodder tower. Probably not going to happen, though.

 

[Critter721]

I'm so excited to try this! Just bought some feed quality wheat at the mill. We'll see how it goes. Thanks for educating me!

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

I thought I would post an update on the chia sprout experiment.

It didn't work at all. They turned into blob of goo, some sort of sprouted, and some just rotted and stank. So I asked my friend Google.

Remember the Ch-ch-ch-chia pets? They were probably made out of terra cotta. A couple of websites said to put the seeds in a terra cotta plate, like a plant pot bottom, but without the hole. Soak that, and it absorbs water. Keep it moist -- sitting in a shallow pan with 1/4" water, or spray it several times a day.

I'm gonna try that. We'll see.

I hate Chia now! - Not only because of that stupid ear-worm that i will have to endure for a couple of hours now, but you're right:
Just adding a little bit of Chia seeds to a batch of mixed seeds will ruin the whole batch. It turns into a pudding, won't let the water drain and start to rot pretty quickly.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

Will chickens eat the roots of the fodder?

Absolutely! - If you're too slow, they will devour your fingers too!

 

[Sally PB]

Sorry about the four-letter-word starting with "c" becoming an ear worm.

So far, I've only had luck sprouting it in dirt, but then it molded about the time the sprouts were an inch tall. I have a couple more ideas. I'll let you all know if I have any success. If not, well, I have about 10 years worth of the stuff to add to smoothies, oatmeal, etc.