How much do chickens eat, really?

[nuthatched]

I was watching my chickens argue over a lettuce core and I started wondering how much a chicken really eats.
Do they eat until the crops full? How much does a crop hold?
Does the crop just empty over night or does it empty during the day time too?
Why are my mudsuckers always starving when their feeders are full?!
Thanks!

 

[Hei 20]

I was watching my chickens argue over a lettuce core and I started wondering how much a chicken really eats.
Do they eat until the crops full? How much does a crop hold?
Does the crop just empty over night or does it empty during the day time too?
Why are my mudsuckers always starving when their feeders are full?!
Thanks!

They eat all day long. I believe I read somewhere that the food going in their mouth sits in the crop for like 12 hrs. Then it goes to the next process

 

[Ebony Rose]

Having weighed and measured their feed, I have determined that each adult chicken of average build (not the exclusive meat birds) consumes about a quarter-pound (four ounces) of fresh, balanced feed daily and will supplement the grain that you offer with bugs, weeds and your garden if they can figure out a way to get into it. As for the birds bred specifically for meat (not eggs), they'll eat from sun up until sun down, seldom moving further from the groceries than the nearest source of water.

 

[Fallenone05]

My birds have access to feed 24/7, unless they eat their goat trough empty, but it's refilled as soon as I see it's empty. They get access to my whole yard and eat whatever grass and bugs they want. Their crops looked *stuffed* after foraging all day long, especially considering they'll forage, go eat pellets, forage, eat pellets, rinse repeat, all day long.

I've always wondered just how much they eat, but their crops are always flatter/empty in the morning and they eat pellets almost immediately after waking up.

 

[ackie]

A quarter-pound each a day! Let's rationalize that my free range birds eat 3/4 feed and 1/4 bugs & such (based on no facts, just guessing)... that's 3/16 lb feed per chicken per day. Let's round my chickens to, oh heck, 40? That's 7.5 lb per day. That means a 50 lb bag lasts 6 2/3 days.. I'll call it 7. And I think it's like 12 dollars so I'm spending almost 2$ (1.71$) a day on freeloading chickens hahaahhaah cry

 

[Ebony Rose]

There's no getting around it, producing your own eggs costs more than simply going to the grocer and buying the cheapest dozen that you can find. I cannot get the same discount on feed that 'Big Ag' gets, but I also don't need to pump that feed full of antibiotics just to keep my flock alive. Balance the price of your home grown eggs with the knowledge of how your flock has been managed, the humane and loving way that you tend to their needs, the quality of feed and space given to them, their overall health and well being AND with however much you value your entertainment from watching the daily antics of your flock and the profound difference in taste and texture of your eggs. For me, the advantages of producing eggs in my own backyard far outweigh the slightly higher cost per egg.

 

[ackie]

Oh I know. My chickens are entirely for fun. I let them free range so much that I dont know where they lay eggs most of the time which means sometimes I get surprise clutches of chicks! And right now I know where one is laying and I'm unreasonably thrilled haha. But my birds are a replacement for a normal persons entertainment/shopping budget and I'm perfectly happy with that. I just laugh when my roommate thinks me selling chickens is putting me in the positive - no I sold those 20 cockrells at a loss because I dont want to feed them anymore! (But he also thinks that growing your own vegetables is cost effective which it is NOT either, for the same reason. Big anything is going to do it more efficiently and for cheaper than small backyard anything.)

 

[Al Gerhart]

Yeah, quarter pound per day for a laying hen. Ignore the roosters as they do not eat much at all assuming you have a normal rooster to hen ratio.

Always a good idea to monitor feed usage so you catch feed theft before it gets too bad. Write the date on the new bag when you open it, divide your number of birds by 4 and write that on the bag, and that gives you the number of days your bag of feed should last.