How much grit do you chickens eat?

crystlln

Chirping
Aug 10, 2021
37
96
71
New chicken keeper, with 8-10 week old chickens. Some of them will sit at the container and eat grit like it's food! I watched one eat for several minutes the other day before I shoo-ed her away. Is this an appropriate sized grit pictured below? Do you know what volume/chicken is normal or the upward limit? Thanks!
 

Attachments

  • IMG_20211026_121729712.jpg
    IMG_20211026_121729712.jpg
    420.6 KB · Views: 22
New chicken keeper, with 8-10 week old chickens. Some of them will sit at the container and eat grit like it's food! I watched one eat for several minutes the other day before I shoo-ed her away. Is this an appropriate sized grit pictured below? Do you know what volume/chicken is normal or the upward limit? Thanks!
Usually the ones that eat more grit then others also are eating more feed and require the extra grit.
 
Your grit looks decent size for their age but they can probably upgrade to a bigger size soon.

View attachment 2879567

If they're gorging on it because it's new or novel, I'd just put out small amounts at a time and not refill it constantly, until they're better at regulating their intake.
Thank you! Do you think about a tablespoon/day is enough for the six of them? I just really have no idea how much they need. They have areas in their run with dirt too and get to free range a couple times a week.
 
Thank you! Do you think about a tablespoon/day is enough for the six of them? I just really have no idea how much they need. They have areas in their run with dirt too and get to free range a couple times a week.
That should be easily more than they'd need (hopefully they'll stop eating so much grit once they get used to having it around). As a general rule chickens will load up on select pieces of grit, and then not really need more until those pieces start to wear down and no longer crush food as efficiently, at which point they pass them from their system.
 
I have a couple small PVC feeders for grit and calcium. I fill them up maybe once every 2-3 months. So my chickens do not eat very much grit or calcium. Having said that, my chickens spend most of their day outside in a chicken run where they can pick up small rocks and such from the ground. I bought one bag of grit and calcium 3 years ago, and have maybe 3/4 of the bags still not used.
 

New posts New threads Active threads

Back
Top Bottom