Is 22% enough?

[keckels]

I'm feeding 24, but hasn't t bought about soybean meal, I should be able to pick that up at a local feedmill.

 

[mochicken]

The soybean meal, where do you all get yours? I feed mine 24% but would love to add some extra. I have a mealworm colony that is establishing, I have been sifting lately to get a good idea of numbers and I am at probably 10K plus tiny worms, barely visible tiny lol. In a couple months I will have a good enough colony established that I can dry some and keep some cool to keep them stunted but right now I am stuck buying them.

For people that just want to supplement with mealworms, go to petco or buy 1000 online, separate the batch and keep half in the fridge to stunt their growth and feed a few to the birds every now and then and then take the other half and start a colony, it will take 3-4 months to get a good colony going but when you do you will be able to reach in and get a cupful if you wanted to. I have my colony in 3 separate shoe box type plastic totes, one with baby worms, one with bigger worms and pupa, and one with just beetles. Some people separate their pupa but I dont, whatever I am doing must be working because I have turned 1000 worms into 10k plus with nothing more than adding carrots for moisture and adding chicken layer crumbles as their bedding.

 

[wbruder17]

Well, I found my first egg today! Yippee!

 

[bigshawn]

Quote:
congrats...

 

[Chick Charm]

Ya know, you could cook that egg and feed it back to your quail for extra proein!

 

[wbruder17]

Quote:
Haha! Yea, one quail egg will be more than enough protein for the whole dozen! Haha! Perhaps if my chickens EVER start production again, I will have some extra for the quail! And chukers, which I STILL don't know if they are boy or girl.

 

[quailgal]

A vet told me raising protein that much with soybean alone could cause a potentially undesirable amino acid imbalance? Anyone know anything about this?

 

[joe125]

Quote:
This is why most people (Like Me) use an off the shelf game bird ration, rather than trying to mix up a batch of GBS out of meal worms, scratch feed, soybean meal, boiled eggs, cat food, bisquick, and freshly picked buggers.

Sometimes you just have to find a good feed store, order the right feed, then buy a few hundred/thousand pounds of the good stuff, and avoid the (Save a buck) opportunistic trek to the mega pet non-feed store. Who shall remain nameless. I will give you their initials... Tractor Supply Company!

 

[wbruder17]

Where the heck is the funny post icon on this new fangled contraption of a BYC page?

 

[joe125]

Not sure my friend, but I would pay good money if the spelling correction thing worked like it used to, because I can't spell worth a shoot!

There it is