I’m getting chicks, which starter food should I use?🐥

[Future vet]

I’m getting chicks and I need a feed from tractor supply,that is the only close feed store. So if you can look at their website and show me or email me.,if you found the healthiest starter. I am a beginner and I’m not a pro so thanks! I am getting them beginning of March!!!! If you are getting goats or have some email me, I know a lot about them and felt with many.Thank you!

 

[cherrynberry]

I personally like Purina chick grower, 20% protein, crumble, and unmedicated. Some people like to feed medicated feed though.

 

[Poodlemum]

We’ve had issues with coccidiosis, so I get medicated feed since it’s more available (are your chicks vaccinated?). Just whatever is cheapest at the time! Mannapro usually and many times with our grocery pickup at Walmart

 

[Brooks_]

Without knowing your location I can't see what's available to you. Based on what is available to me, Purina flock raiser. Purina, Nutrena, or Dumor starter/grower. Do you plan on medicated? That will alter your options. Be sure to check mill dates as freshness counts.

Regardless of what it's called. 18-20% protein. About 3.5% fat, 5% fiber, and 1% calcium...all +/-.

 

[Future vet]

We’ve had issues with coccidiosis, so I get medicated feed since it’s more available (are your chicks vaccinated?). Just whatever is cheapest at the time! Mannapro usually and many times with our grocery pickup at Walmart

I am getting my chicks next week.

 

[Future vet]

Without knowing your location I can't see what's available to you. Based on what is available to me, Purina flock raiser. Purina, Nutrena, or Dumor starter/grower. Do you plan on medicated? That will alter your options. Be sure to check mill dates as freshness counts.

Regardless of what it's called. 18-20% protein. About 3.5% fat, 5% fiber, and 1% calcium...all +/-.

I live on johns island. But we normally get feed at tractor supply Ravenel. Thank you so much

 

[U_Stormcrow]

Goats and Chickens should be kept separated, as you likely already know. So that, as much as possible, they can be fed seperately. Chicken feed much more dangerous to goats than goat feed is to chickens. Chickens may peck at goat mineral a few times as they explore their world, then will promptly ignore it. Still, keep it out of reach of your hatchlings and adolescents.

In Ravenel, if you are getting a small number of chickens, or the bag isn't fresh (made in the last month or so), get Purina's Flock Raiser Crumbles (5# bag) if you don't need medicated. [Assuming you've had no chickens before, and have "virgin ground", non-medicated is likely fine. Coccidia is everywhere humans have been, yes, but reflexively medicating isn't necessary unless you know (or strongly suspect) you've had a coccidia outbreak recently on your grounds. That said, it generally doesn't hurt - personal choice, informed by risk tolerance. If they fdon't have the small flockraiser (and you are buying small), get either the Purina Start/Grow (medicated or not, your call) or the Dumor Starter (medicated or not, your choice), in that order of preference.

If you are going non-Medicated, are getting a lot of chicks, and the bag is fresh, get the Purina Flock Raiser Crumbles 50# bag.

If the store employee tells you that you should be getting starter or starter/grower instead of flock raiser, tell him/her to compare the nutritional labels and explain why to you. They will learn something useful for the next time they try to "help" a customer out.

[My flock is in my Singnature, below]

 

[U_Stormcrow]

Follow up, if "Natural" (as the industry defines that term) is important to you, go with the Nutrena Naturewise All Flock.

I do NOT recommend Organic. Not only because the benefits of "organic" are mostly speculative, and the cost is largely prohibitive for flocks of any size, but because organic sources of Methionine are very hard to come by in the plant world - so much so that Organic feeds are allowed to add a (small) amount of synthetic methionine in their mixes (appears as dl-Methionine on the label), and generally brings the Met content up to about 0.3, sometimes as high as 0.35%.

Methionine is the most critical limiting amino acid in a chicken, responsible primarily for connective tissues and things like the digestive system. A developing bird - hatchling, juvenile, adolescent - needs more methionine than an adult bird, and a shortage of it is most damaging to them during that period. Recommends are for Met levels of 0.5 - 0.7% during those stages. Birds that don't get it never measure up to their full potential.

So whatever else it is, as a practical matter, feeding Organic from the start is handicapping your chicks for the rest of their lives - and if you don't (and check off lots of other boxes besides), you can't claim Organic for your birds.

 

[Future vet]

Goats and Chickens should be kept separated, as you likely already know. So that, as much as possible, they can be fed seperately. Chicken feed much more dangerous to goats than goat feed is to chickens. Chickens may peck at goat mineral a few times as they explore their world, then will promptly ignore it. Still, keep it out of reach of your hatchlings and adolescents.

In Ravenel, if you are getting a small number of chickens, or the bag isn't fresh (made in the last month or so), get Purina's Flock Raiser Crumbles (5# bag) if you don't need medicated. [Assuming you've had no chickens before, and have "virgin ground", non-medicated is likely fine. Coccidia is everywhere humans have been, yes, but reflexively medicating isn't necessary unless you know (or strongly suspect) you've had a coccidia outbreak recently on your grounds. That said, it generally doesn't hurt - personal choice, informed by risk tolerance. If they fdon't have the small flockraiser (and you are buying small), get either the Purina Start/Grow (medicated or not, your call) or the Dumor Starter (medicated or not, your choice), in that order of preference.

If you are going non-Medicated, are getting a lot of chicks, and the bag is fresh, get the Purina Flock Raiser Crumbles 50# bag.

If the store employee tells you that you should be getting starter or starter/grower instead of flock raiser, tell him/her to compare the nutritional labels and explain why to you. They will learn something useful for the next time they try to "help" a customer out.

[My flock is in my Singnature, below]

Yes I will definitely separate them.

 

[Future vet]

Without knowing your location I can't see what's available to you. Based on what is available to me, Purina flock raiser. Purina, Nutrena, or Dumor starter/grower. Do you plan on medicated? That will alter your options. Be sure to check mill dates as freshness counts.

Regardless of what it's called. 18-20% protein. About 3.5% fat, 5% fiber, and 1% calcium...all +/-.

I live on johns island, but we go to tractor supply on ravanel.