I have been trying to make my own feed/seed mix and want to if this is good

[Perris]

You overstate the case.

target protein levels (and a good amino acid profile w/i that crude protein number) can't be achieved

with the kind of materials you are thinking about as feed, and as usual taking commercial minima as your base line / ideal, which leads to a misplaced focus on minute amounts of limiting amino acids.

Mountain gorillas in Uganda eat leaves so high in protein that their diet (for 8 months of the year) typically has about 30% protein. There is plenty of protein in leaves for most animals, including chickens.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

You overstate the case.

with the kind of materials you are thinking about as feed, and as usual taking commercial minima as your base line / ideal, which leads to a misplaced focus on minute amounts of limiting amino acids.

Mountain gorillas in Uganda eat leaves so high in protein that their diet (for 8 months of the year) typically has about 30% protein. There is plenty of protein in leaves for most animals, including chickens.

I invite you to provide a working recipe from the available ingredients then.

I did consider much more than just crude protein levels. To reach an equivalent CP to their off the shelf feed, their birds would have to dramatically increase their daily consumption - depending on the mix, 34-70%. That's already a challenge - and doing so would result in a very high fat diet. Not that fat is inherently bad, but that, in combination w/ greatly increased consumption by weight, would result in dietary energy intakes well above metabolic needs. Not dissimilar from feeding layers a half kilo of corn each day as their ration and hoping they are healthy on it.

and I'd like to see your source on the Mountain Gorilla diet. The sources I quickly found during lunch aren't saying what you represent above.

NYT article

Study on NIH

 

[Perris]

provide a working recipe from the available ingredients then.

Let me know if I should make any changes

Add some animal protein, as much as your flock wants to eat. Judge it and vary it by observation daily.

your source on the Mountain Gorilla diet

is the

Study on NIH

If you read the whole article, you will find that gorillas prefer and select a diet with about 19% protein, but for 8 months of the year they are forced into an all-leaf diet that delivers 31% protein. My point is that natural forages can have high protein levels, and your calculations always ignore them. They do not lend themselves to recipes and maths because they vary from plant to plant, place to place, time to time etc. But there will be some growing in Pakistan, from where the OP apparently hails, and if they let their flock forage, the chickens will find what they need, including enough protein. The appetite for protein is the dominant appetite for most of the species that Raubenheimer and Simpson have studied.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

Add some animal protein, as much as your flock wants to eat. Judge it and vary it by observation daily.

[....] My point is that natural forages can have high protein levels, and your calculations always ignore them. They do not lend themselves to recipes and maths because they vary from plant to plant, place to place, time to time etc. [....]

So, "No", you can't.

And yes, I'm asked to look at a feed, not a management method - so I don't assume the presence of suitable forage whose quantity, quality, and availability vary seasonally, and which - depending on management methods - may not be available at all. ...but will somehow make up for predicted nutritional deficiencies in a given feed recipe, because "magic"?

 

[Perris]

On the contrary, yes you can. You cannot ignore it just because you can't count it.

 

[Perris]

And 'magic' suggests that you don't understand the nutritional geometry. You might want to read the articles on that before making further assumptions.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

The challenge was to do so from this ingredient list.
pearl millet
corn
wheat
whole oats
chick starter
red rice
mung beans
chickpeas
safflower seeds
sunflower seeds
mustard seeds

Don't take it personally, I couldn't either.

But sure, if we can introduce other ingredients? Any of several defatted seed meals would do it. Soy meal, peanut meal. Maybe alfalfa meal - would be a little harder, but I think it likely possible. Porcine blood meal, fish meal, crab meal... Plenty of possibilities. That's easy.

 

[susanatull]

I ferment the chicken food every day. I alternate the containers to make sure it is fermented and not to old.It last only one day outside, the chickes clean the feeders pretty well, sometimes I have to hose the feeders down and use a brush once a week. It seems that fermented food keeps my chickens sacieted, better than just dry food. I keep some dry feed available for the ones that need extra food plus garden vegetables and leftover human food, they are the best composter available.

 

[nao57]

Never heard before that chickens can get sick from wheat or other grains the manufacturers put in the scratch they sell here.
Obvious you should not feed them just one type of grains. My manufacturer says scratch should be no more than ⅓ of their food intake to avoid problems. Scratch is mainly giving a lot by chicken owners who let the chickens free range in a green environment like a natural garden, a meadow or in a forest.

It has no use to compare chickens with sheep or cows. They are both herbivores (mainly grass eaters) and have a complete other digesting systems.

I respectfully disagree that there's no basis of transfer of content to different animals. The reason there is SOME basis, but not necessarily everything is that most livestock need a certain amount of protein levels. And they usually aren't that far different. Though some differences exist for grass eaters. And one point showing there's some transferable content is, everything can get sick. Mold and glyphosate illnesses and other things can happen to all animals.

But some of what you is true that there is some major differences. (hope this response was helpful to you but not sounding harsh.)

The 1/3 intake guideline by your manufacturer is pretty similar to what I saw on other information. In that we are very compatible. There is a lot of information that scratch grains and second hand grains are often good and useful.

Thank you very much for the information and dialogue.

...

 

[Altairsky]

Comparing a chicken's digestive system and nutrition needs to a cow's is like comparing a human digestive system and nutrition needs to a snake's. It really makes that much sense.