HYPOTHETICAL DISCUSSION: What to feed your chickens when we can't buy chicken feed anymore

[MyPetNugget]

Add leaves to the run and that will attract worms, bugs, spiders, and a bunch of other little treats. It also makes good composting so you don't have to clean the run so often. The chickens will even dig and stir it up for you! Plus, like many other people on here said, foraging is a lot healthier for the chickens. Adding leaves to the run will let all the little bugs and stuff get in there, without the predators.

 

[punk-a-doodle]

I plan to see how ranging and then raising insects and mice and growing fodder, veggies, seeds, and fruit sustains them for both egg and meat purposes. Need to figure out how to keep caged mice that aren't free-ranging fed though.

 

[Triple Willow]

I plan to see how ranging and then raising insects and mice and growing fodder, veggies, seeds, and fruit sustains them for both egg and meat purposes. Need to figure out how to keep caged mice that aren't free-ranging fed though.

Check with reptile keepers. A lot of them grow mice to feed to their snakes.

 

[Steena]

I don't understand why one would raise mice to feed to the chickens?
Isn't free ranging, vegetables, grains and other, ample. I didn't know that chickens need meat?
Do they?

 

[MyPetNugget]

I don't understand why one would raise mice to feed to the chickens?
Isn't free ranging, vegetables, grains and other, ample. I didn't know that chickens need meat?
Do they?

It is not necessary for the chickens to eat meat, but while free ranging, I would imagine that they can get mice, chipmunks and other rodents.

 

[centrarchid]

I don't understand why one would raise mice to feed to the chickens?
Isn't free ranging, vegetables, grains and other, ample. I didn't know that chickens need meat?
Do they?

Chickens like their relatives are optimized for an omnivorous diet made up of vegetative plant materials, seeds, fruits and small animals. As juveniles and especially chicks the ideal diet is dominated by animal prey. The animals are dominated by invertebrates (insects, spiders, crustaceans, molluscs, etc.) with only occasionally small vertebrates (mostly reptiles and amphibians) and more rarely small rodents and birds. Obviously chicks will not be able to subdue anything but the smallest vertebrates.

We have folks without a lot of knowledge and extreme ideas putting out extreme thoughts on this making for a messy concept of what is needed.

 

[ChocolateMouse]

Funny how free speech works like that.... People can express whatever ideas they choose whether you like them or not.

That being said, raising mice isn't the worst idea if you need to get a source of protein, but mice eat many of the same things chickens do. They survive mostly on grasses and seed, so you could feed them cheap grain but if you're raising grain why not just feed it to your chickens anyhow? I have kept mice for my snake before and you can just feed 'em chicken scratch. You'd be much better off trapping mice or raising some type of bug. Bugs are a more ideal protein for chickens and often eat things chickens can't. That's the whole point of sustainable meats; taking something that can eat something you can't and feeding it that to get meat. That's how cows and goats and often chickens work. That's why grazers are such a big deal and have been for a long time. It's like... Why raise a crocodile off of chickens so that you can then eat crocodile meat? You could just eat the chicken meat. It's the same thing. If you chickens are eating mice they could just be eating the grains and grass the mice eat instead.

Earthworms are a great way to raise bugs for your animals. They can be raised no-mess indoors. I have a red worm bucket in my garage and there's like 1000 worms in there. I load it down with some used rabbit bedding or chicken poop and leaves and they thrive. I am going to separate them out into multiple buckets soon and they will be able to multiply even more.

I also like rabbits, or guinea pigs, as a source for food. They both reproduce quickly, eat things we can't (grass, clover, etc) and they can also offer food to our chickens and dogs through skulls and skin and bones and feet and such. If you feel the need for a meat source for your chickens that is probably a better way to do it; scraps from butchering, rather than raising out something else entirely.

 

[Allysha1990]

I have seen chickens eating mice, heck I know my hen house will always be rodent free because they are vicious little buggers when it comes to eating small animals! Always makes me shake my head when I see "Vegetarian Fed" on an egg carton..
As for raising something like mice to feed to my hens, I would feel bad about throwing a little mousey to it's demise lol.
I actually fed my flock some bacon today and it was so funny to watch them run around in the coop trying to keep their bacon away from the others!

 

[centrarchid]

This is not a matter of free speech. It is a matter of accuracy. Raising a mammal as a food for something you will consume is extremely inefficient having a lot in common with raising sheep to feed wolves so you can eat the wolves. You also cannot count on chickens to control mice by eating them even though they will consume them when given opportunity. Check your3e supposedly mouse free coops at night. When you see mouse sign ask yourself why the chickens are not controlling them by eating them.

 

[Allysha1990]

Wow, you need to take that chip off your shoulder buddy. I can assure you there are no mice in my coop, and I am trying to have a little friendly banter here with fellow BYCs and you are getting all fired up of stupid little comments. Chill