how much should 14 chickens eat a day?

[chicksnducks]

I have 14 total....four are two weeks old, and the rest are about 9 weeks old. How much should they be eating a day? they no longer share food with the ducks and I am not sure how much to give them and should I feed once or twice a day???
thanks!

I just love backyard chickens.com and all the advice that I get from here!

 

[keljonma]

Growing chicks need nutrition. I think it's best to make sure they have access to food and water free-choice, 24/7. Unless they are meat birds, like Cornish X.

 

[Queen of the Lilliputians]

I don't have precise amounts for you, but at this point my almost-3wkers have outgrown their feeder. I refill it 3x a day right now (most of it's gone, but there are also shavings and poop covering what's left). I watched them last night, and in a 1/2 hr they had eaten half of what I had given them.

I'm going to the feedstore tomorrow for a bigger one. Hopefully that'll hold 'em. They sure are hungry little guys. Although, when you look at how fast they grow, I guess it shouldn't surprise me! If layers eat this much, I can't even begin to imagine what meat birds would be like!

-Meghan

 

[akyramoto]

a lot!!! haha. ya can't give you an exact #. for my adult birds they eat about 50lbs in 2-4 weeks. ( 9 hens, one roo), my teenagers just finished off their first 50lb bag - which took about a month ( 5 pullets, one roo).

i went from having one bag of food to about 4 - chick starter, general purpose crumble, laying pellet & scratch, not to mention bags of oyster shells & grit.

sounds kinda complicated now!! lol.


those growing chickens are mini 'pigs'!!

 

[Mac in Wisco]

Quote:
Just keep food available, they'll eat what they need. I started with fourteen chicks and a fifty lb bag of starter lasted a long time.

The general rule of thumb is about 1/4 lb of feed per adult hen per day, but that goes down with how much they are foraging on their own. That works out to about 3 lbs a day for a dozen hens. I always keep food in the feeders and they eat as they see fit. I have a dozen hens that I feed a mix of sunflower seeds and layer feed. I think I've gone through about 200 lbs since mid March or a little more than 2 lbs a day.

 

[chicksnducks]

ok I think I got an idea ....
The two cornish x s eat like there is no tomorrow...
I try to feed the four littler ones so that they can eat without the bigger ones chasing them away.
I go in and change water and add food every day, twice a day...sometimes there is food still in the feeder and sometimes it is empty.
I try to let them forage for about an hour a day (so I can watch them and keep them safe).