Is high quality feed worth the money?

[Silkie fluff butts]

I love my silkies. Its taken me 6 years to build my flock it's so hard to find good quality Bearded silkie breeding stalk. Most are bearded/ non bearded crosses. I do what I have to keep them healthy. I could tell just by there feathers that it's was good feed. I also like they have higher protein layer feed. I'm just glad I found it cheaper.

What exactly is the difference you see in their feathers? I have 2 -8 month old silkie hens. Got them from a chain feed store. I suspect they aren't great quality, although we love them none the less. I feed a low/mediocre quality feed, but they free range and get healthy treats. They have been laying more since free ranging.

 

[FoxySonia]

I'm in Queens, NYC, and don't have a large yard, and what yard space my 37 chickens live in is pretty barren so there's not much for them to eat, so I feed them the highest quality feed I could find, one with no by-products (food waste products), no soy, no canola, and no or minimal corn), which is Scratch and Peck Organic 18% Layer Feed, which is about $65 for 40 lbs, and Grubbly Farms Layer Crumble, which cost about $90 for 60 lbs but I usually get it when I can use a 25% discount code. I also give them some 5-grain scratch ($25 for 40 lbs), Grub Terra BSFL Grubs ($35 for 5 lbs), and sunflower seed chips $11 for 6 lbs) mixed with their feed. Occasionally also give them vegetables such as lettuce, cabbage, assorted leafy vegetables, squash, cucumber, and as a rare occasional treat - fruit such as watermelon, deseeded apple or pear, or whole wheat bread with scrambled eggs, and on cold winter days might give them fresh corn or cooked Old Fashioned Oatmeal. I also provide grit ($30 for 25 lbs of grit for the standard size chickens and $40 for 50 lbs of grit for the bantams) and oyster shell flakes ($8 for 7 lbs). I haven't figured out how much money I spend to feed my 24 bantam and 13 standard sized chickens but I'm sure is a lot, but because of where I live, there's no Tractor Supply or farm animal feed store near me, so I have no choice but to buy their food (and sand litter and hemp bedding) online (mainly from Chewy and Amazon) and get it delivered, at double to triple the cost. I'm sure that I spend more money on my chickens than on myself or my cats (2 indoor and 3 outdoor feral cats). If I had known it was going to be this expensive to feed and care for 37 chickens (adding the money I've spent on housing, feeders, waterers, first aid supplies, worm, mite and lice preventative, mite and lice treatments which include Elector PSP, and treatment for bumblefoot, and other expenses) I might have decided not to have chickens. I love them but the little nuggets are incredibly expensive.

 

[Garry A]

Without seeing the guaranteed nutritional analysis, I can't join you in agreeing that it's "quality". Give me a recipe, not just an ingredients list, and I might have more comfort with it. Though some ingredients lists are obviously deficient on their face.

Name names, man. No one benefits from anonymous comments about nameless feeds. That's how we as individuals learn, and BYC as a collective grows its knowledge base.

and yes, entirely possible faceless farmer's feed is both more nutrient and more energy dense, potentially making it cheaper on a cost per serving basis than the cost per bag suggests. Normally, that's a benefit, but not if you are trying to raise certain butterballs as breeders...

I apologise for not naming names but living in Peka Peka New Zealand I didn't think it would be too helpful. I think the point I was trying to meet is that a poultry breeder whose ingredients are tailored to local conditions and breeds may produce a more targeted product than a commercial company. We both have New Hampshire flocks.

 

[Cj Tracker]

Lacto Fermentation is a form of anaerobic fermentation reliant on lactobacillus, the same bacteria responsible for kimchi, yogurt, kefir, sauerkraut, pickles, etc.

For fermented chicken feed, the easiest way to make it is to add feed to a five gallon bucket, 1/3 to 1/2 of the way up. Cover with water. Stir. Add more water. Repeat until the feed is fully submerged (this step is necessary because feeds tend to absorb a LOT of water, crumble most, pellet close, whole grain least). Now add another inch of water. This ensures the process is anaerobic (without oxygen).

Wait.

How long depends on your climate and conditions. A couple days is normal.

I can't describe the smell of a good culture anymore, because I don't have much sense of smell (auto accident - damage extensive), but its pretty distinct, and not really displeasing. At this point, you have a fermented starter, like sourdough.

Scoop out what you want to feed your birds - a strainer helps to keep excess liquid in the bucket where you want it. Replace with an equal quantity of fresh feed. Repeat each day. If the bucket starts to smell bad, something else may be colonizing - start over - but a good ferment ensures so many beneficial bacteria are present that its hard for anything else to move in.

Some people take out "insurance" on their ferment by adding a tub of plain yogurt or a cup of sourdough starter to help innoculate the mix at the start, and most keep a lid, loosely, on their buckets.

Once you've done it a few times, and have a good sense of how much water your feed absorbs at the start, you can mark the inside of your bucket, fill feed to the line, then add water to the higher line, stir and forget.

If you feed as many birds as I do (flock in sig), in a climate like mine, you can line up a couple buckets and get started, one each day. By day three (in the spring, summer, fall) I've got a very good ferment (day two, sometimes) going, and dump the whole bucket to the flock - which I then refill with fresh food and water to start over. The residue on the inside of the bucket helps jumpstart things. SO I can just rotate thru a collection of three or four 5 gallon buckets, not really much more effort than the normal feeding routine.

That said, I do not normally ferment, I usually just offer cold or hot wet oatmeal-like mash. The increased bioavailability of the fermented feed offers a small savings on consumption, but the "looser" consistency compared to my thick oatmeal means I lose more to waste - even serving it in plastic rain gutters - the factors tend to pretty closely balance out for me.

Last notes (speculative, NOT experiential). Fermented feed should *slightly* resist freezing as compared to a wet mash, by a couple degrees. I have hot water near at the edge of my pasture, which is why I do hot/cold water mash depending on season. So that may be a marginal benefit if you are in a borderline region with breif AM and evening temps in the freezing zone. Overnight temps don't matter, since the birds don't generally eat after dark. Second, the colder it is on average, the longer it takes for your ferment to get started on make progress. My temps average around 70 degrees, so a three or four bucket rotation is all I need to feed a flock of 70. If your temps average 50s, you will either need more buckets in rotation, or a longer wait with a much smaller flock.

Hope that helps!

Thank you for the detailed response, I appreciate it!
I'm in NJ with freezing temps this week but my garage is about 50ish degrees. I'll try it in my basement first and see how it goes.
Would this process work better with scratch grains than crumbles?

 

[Rangergord]

In my area we don’t have a tremendous selection of brands and types of poultry feed. There are a handful of expensive bags of organic feeds I have never seen anyone actually buy and I don’t think organic and quality are always the same.

Fresh and locally produced is better. Not much budget feed either. I could drive all day to a regional elevator and feed mill and get a pallet bag of 1200 lbs of lay ration custom milled. That would save a bit but I have too few birds to make it worth my while.

There is no all flock feed anywhere. It is often said that ISA brown hens require an 18 % lay ration. No one sells any. 16 or 17 % is tops. In the summer with foraging that’s not a problem. They probably have a diet of 20 % on good range.

So I am custom blending using HiPro 36 % Poultry protein supplement and cracked wheat. I follow the manufacturers formulas to blend an 18% ration with oyster shell.

I am fermenting it with 5% alfalfa pellets and skim milk and whey powder. It brought my 3 hens out of their molt in a month and have continued to lay 2 and sometimes three eggs a day through our very cold and dark winter with the assistance of some electric light. With a small flock I can afford to spend a bit more.

 

[ChookieG]

Would this process work better with scratch grains than crumbles?

I noticed that scratch grains will take a far longer time to ferment completely as the surface area of grains are much less than that of crumbles... ie. less inaccessible to microorganisms.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

I noticed that scratch grains will take a far longer time to ferment completely as the surface area of grains are much less than that of crumbles... ie. less inaccessible to microorganisms.

@Cj Tracker - same reason whole grains go "stale" more slowly than pellet or crumble - less surface area overall, and frequently, nature's "shell" against intruders remains intact, too.

Of course, that also makes them less digestible in your chickens, and likely is the reason they developed a crop* - to crack those whole grains and expose the vitamin packed insides.

*edit - GIZZARD. See Below. I'm sleep deprived. Thanks to NatJ for correcting my moment of stupid. Horse shoes Hand grenades Atomics. The only places "close" counts...

 

[NatJ]

Of course, that also makes them less digestible in your chickens, and likely is the reason they developed a crop - to crack those whole grains and expose the vitamin packed insides.

I think you mean gizzard, not crop.

Gizzard holds rocks to grind things up, crop is the sack on the front where the food goes first after the chicken swallows it.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

I think you mean gizzard, not crop.

Gizzard holds rocks to grind things up, crop is the sack on the front where the food goes first after the chicken swallows it.

Yes I did.

COFFEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!

I was travelling all weekend, and have had NOT NEARLY enough sleep. About 10 hours in the last 4 days and some change. Breathe easy, I'm off the roads now.

THANK YOU for the correction.

 

[Happy hen lover]

In my area we don’t have a tremendous selection of brands and types of poultry feed. There are a handful of expensive bags of organic feeds I have never seen anyone actually buy and I don’t think organic and quality are always the same.

Fresh and locally produced is better. Not much budget feed either. I could drive all day to a regional elevator and feed mill and get a pallet bag of 1200 lbs of lay ration custom milled. That would save a bit but I have too few birds to make it worth my while.

There is no all flock feed anywhere. It is often said that ISA brown hens require an 18 % lay ration. No one sells any. 16 or 17 % is tops. In the summer with foraging that’s not a problem. They probably have a diet of 20 % on good range.

So I am custom blending using HiPro 36 % Poultry protein supplement and cracked wheat. I follow the manufacturers formulas to blend an 18% ration with oyster shell.

I am fermenting it with 5% alfalfa pellets and skim milk and whey powder. It brought my 3 hens out of their molt in a month and have continued to lay 2 and sometimes three eggs a day through our very cold and dark winter with the assistance of some electric light. With a small flock I can afford to spend a bit more.

You ferment alfalfa pellets? I never thought of that. I ferment their 20% starter.
feed.

IMHO I think the name brand aren't any better that store brand stuff. They have to pay for commercials somehow.