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

I will try your method with the jar,. Where did you kept the jar, no, better how did you kept it, cold or warm?

Nothing fancy. I used a mason jar, the lid ring, and a piece of window screen instead of a lid. I would soak the beans overnight in the jar, leaving it on the kitchen counter. The next morning, I'd tip the jar over into the sink and let it drain out all the water. Then I would give it a good rinse or two, then set it back on the kitchen counter out of direct sunlight. 3X per day I would rinse and drain the beans in the jar. You don't want any standing water in the jar. The window screen lid allows good air flow to help dry out the seeds between rinsing. You might want to lay the jar on its side to promote max surface area and air flow. By about the 5-6 day, the sprouts were a good eating size and then I would put them into a container in the refrigerator. The sprouts should be eaten within the week, or they can go bad.
 
Yeah, I went online to maybe order some of these stackable bins, but in the checkout they were $7.35 per bin. I must have misread the ad, because I thought there were 6 bins per carton and the carton was $7.35. But in the checkout, it states minimum order of 6 bins at $44.10. You have to order in quantities of 6. So 12 bins would cost $88.20. And the shipping cost was over $23.00. So, over $100.00 for that setup. I did not place the order.

Do you remember where you got your stackable bins and how much they cost?

I think one of the biggest selling points on the fodder tower I built was that I spent only 10 dollars total on 10 Dollar Tree dish pans and used scrap wood for the tower. It was a cheap way to see if you really want to try to grow fodder or not. I do like the idea of the stackable bins, and wonder if it might be possible to convert the cheap dish pans to a stackable design. That might be another option if workable.

Sorry for the late reply. I bought them on Amazon. Its was a few years ago, but I think I paid $40 for 8 of them.
 
Sorry for the late reply. I bought them on Amazon. Its was a few years ago, but I think I paid $40 for 8 of them.

Thanks for the reply. My seed this year has so far not been good. Currently I'm not growing much of anything in my fodder tower. I will be getting different seed, maybe next week, and try again. I like your stacking bin idea, so I am keeping that in the back of my mind if/when I ever get good seed and start growing fodder again. At the moment, I am still searching for seed that will germinate and grow into fodder.
 
I hope you have success with your sprouting experiment. At the price of $30 per pound for the Purple Top Turnips, you must really have dedicated yourself to your ducks. Lucky them you are willing to try different seeds for fodder and/or spouts.

As for myself, I am dedicated enough to my chickens to buy 100# of barley seed at $12.85 for growing fodder. The last batch of barley seed I bought was no good for fodder, so into the chicken scratch mix it will go. I plan on getting a new batch of barley seed from a different source maybe next week. Hope that new supply is better for fodder.

I had nothing but good luck growing barley fodder last year, but this year the seed has not been good and I am really struggling. Well, fodder is a good supplement to their diet and the only chance I have to give the chickens something green in our Minnesota winters. The commercial feed does contain everything they need to keep healthy, but it's not as exciting as watching them tear into a fresh mat of green fodder.

The white mold I am getting in my fodder bins is all at the base of the grass stem. Today I just cut off the grass tops and fed it to my chickens. At least there is some green in their feed today and I don't have to worry about the white mold in the bin.

Again, I am wondering if the white mold growing in my fodder bins is actually harmful to the chickens or not? The mold does not smell and just looks like cotton balls at the base of the plant. Of course we eat mold all the time in some cheese, so I do know that some molds are OK to eat.
I don't think this is mold; I believe it is part of the root system.
 
I hope you have success with your sprouting experiment. At the price of $30 per pound for the Purple Top Turnips, you must really have dedicated yourself to your ducks. Lucky them you are willing to try different seeds for fodder and/or spouts.

As for myself, I am dedicated enough to my chickens to buy 100# of barley seed at $12.85 for growing fodder. The last batch of barley seed I bought was no good for fodder, so into the chicken scratch mix it will go. I plan on getting a new batch of barley seed from a different source maybe next week. Hope that new supply is better for fodder.

I had nothing but good luck growing barley fodder last year, but this year the seed has not been good and I am really struggling. Well, fodder is a good supplement to their diet and the only chance I have to give the chickens something green in our Minnesota winters. The commercial feed does contain everything they need to keep healthy, but it's not as exciting as watching them tear into a fresh mat of green fodder.

The white mold I am getting in my fodder bins is all at the base of the grass stem. Today I just cut off the grass tops and fed it to my chickens. At least there is some green in their feed today and I don't have to worry about the white mold in the bin.

Again, I am wondering if the white mold growing in my fodder bins is actually harmful to the chickens or not? The mold does not smell and just looks like cotton balls at the base of the plant. Of course we eat mold all the time in some cheese, so I do know that some molds are OK to eat.

Sometimes my get a little mold and I just toss it whole biscuit in the run. I trust a chicken would know what mold to eat and what mold not to eat. Although we raise them they still have a natural instinct.
 
I don't think this is mold; I believe it is part of the root system.
Nope! I definitely had small spots of white mold in my bins. Usually it grew around foreign objects like pieces of straw or a dead bug. Since i wash the grains more careful and the temperatures became colder i have no more mold problems.
And even the small spots of mold quickly died when i exposed the bins to sunlight.
 
Nope! I definitely had small spots of white mold in my bins. Usually it grew around foreign objects like pieces of straw or a dead bug. Since i wash the grains more careful and the temperatures became colder i have no more mold problems.
And even the small spots of mold quickly died when i exposed the bins to sunlight.

I have tried better rinsing, removing all foreign objects, less watering during the flood/rinse cycles, adding bleach to the water, and maybe a few other things that don't come to mind at the moment. None of that seemed to work very well because my seeds this years have a very poor germination rate. Without the actual seed growing, I think there is just more opportunity for mold to creep in and take hold. When the seeds germinate and grow well, I had no mold problems. Nothing seems to really help fight mold growth if the seeds are not growing.

I plan on going into town this coming week and trying a bag of barley seed from the new batch the feed mill just got in. One can only hope for better results. I have proven to myself how easy it is to grow fodder if the seed is good. If the seed is bad, I am clueless......
 
I have tried better rinsing, removing all foreign objects, less watering during the flood/rinse cycles, adding bleach to the water, and maybe a few other things that don't come to mind at the moment. None of that seemed to work very well because my seeds this years have a very poor germination rate. Without the actual seed growing, I think there is just more opportunity for mold to creep in and take hold. When the seeds germinate and grow well, I had no mold problems. Nothing seems to really help fight mold growth if the seeds are not growing.

I plan on going into town this coming week and trying a bag of barley seed from the new batch the feed mill just got in. One can only hope for better results. I have proven to myself how easy it is to grow fodder if the seed is good. If the seed is bad, I am clueless......
There is the »GIGO« principle in computer science »Garbage In -> Garbage Out«
Meaning if you feed garbage into a computer program it will print out garbage.
Same with the seeds and fodder.
Good luck with the new barley!
Field rape seeds are growing fine here, i have one bin in the window, trying to see how much actual green i can get out of it.
 
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