Looking into Poultry nutrition- Fertrell Questions

[BlessedChaosHomestead]

Backstory:
We are starting to breed more, focusing on Bresse & Leghorn atm. (Maybe toward SOP one day.)
While we keep our egg flock on TM NatureCrest for the no soy/corn/gmo recipe.

I have wondered if that’s enough for them. At 16.5% protein that’s weak.
18% for chick starter isn’t the greatest either.

We raised a set of meatbirds on Kalmbach’s non-gmo 22%. My goodness those birds were amazing at butchering time. We also raised some other chicks at that time using the same feed. Which has opened my eyes to it!


The 4 leghorns we kept on that till they joined the big flock grew & feathered out beautifully!
The 2nd grow out group I’ve kept on it almost 100%; they’re all large, healthy, beautiful. And by large one of the sapphire gems, who is a hen, has made me question if she was not a he because of her height! And these are hatchery birds (Hoover babies most likely) came from Rural King. My older Sapphire didn’t get that big that fast.

I was speaking to a breeder last night & they stated they used Fertrell with Nutrena.
They’re the 2nd breeder I’ve seen in a couple days that uses Fertrell. As I was reading on NorthStar Farms about their stuff & they stated they used it.

Would supplementing with Fertrell on top of our layer feed, help the girls??

Would Fertrell + Kalmbach 22% be an even better mix for our grow outs?

We do have to keep costs down so I’m not free to spend $100’s on feed but I would like to increase their nutrition if I could.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

Backstory:
We are starting to breed more, focusing on Bresse & Leghorn atm. (Maybe toward SOP one day.)
While we keep our egg flock on TM NatureCrest for the no soy/corn/gmo recipe.

I have wondered if that’s enough for them. At 16.5% protein that’s weak.
18% for chick starter isn’t the greatest either.

We raised a set of meatbirds on Kalmbach’s non-gmo 22%. My goodness those birds were amazing at butchering time. We also raised some other chicks at that time using the same feed. Which has opened my eyes to it!


The 4 leghorns we kept on that till they joined the big flock grew & feathered out beautifully!
The 2nd grow out group I’ve kept on it almost 100%; they’re all large, healthy, beautiful. And by large one of the sapphire gems, who is a hen, has made me question if she was not a he because of her height! And these are hatchery birds (Hoover babies most likely) came from Rural King. My older Sapphire didn’t get that big that fast.

I was speaking to a breeder last night & they stated they used Fertrell with Nutrena.
They’re the 2nd breeder I’ve seen in a couple days that uses Fertrell. As I was reading on NorthStar Farms about their stuff & they stated they used it.

Would supplementing with Fertrell on top of our layer feed, help the girls??

Would Fertrell + Kalmbach 22% be an even better mix for our grow outs?

We do have to keep costs down so I’m not free to spend $100’s on feed but I would like to increase their nutrition if I could.

Fertrell provides what is essentially a Vitamin premix used by those making their own feed to ensure they cover the vitamins, trace minerals, and metals which may or may not be present in adequate amounts in their agricultural products. Think of it as "insurance" against vitamin/mineral deficiencies.

Unless your birds are showing symptoms of those deficiencies, no reason to think adding Fertrell's will benefit anyone but Fertrell and their retailer.

Fertrell ALSO has a pre-Mix w/ added Methionine (synthetic, dl-Methionine, allowed for use in "organic" feeds). Since Met is an Amino acid, its both a crude protein booster AND a booster of the most critical amino acid in chicken development. Using that product may well improve rate of weight gain, eventual adult size, and a host of lesser metrics. There is legislation limiting the amount of synthetic Met allowed over the lifetime of a bird for commercial flocks, but assuming that doesn't apply to you, its not an issue.

That said, you are probably better off (and cheaper) simply buying a better feed from Tucker Milling than a bare bones layer formulation (slightly better than some, but still, essentially generic "layer"), Have you looked at their Show Flock line of feeds? TM Show FLock Layer 22. TM Show Flock Starter. etc...

 

[U_Stormcrow]

Also, love your user name @BlessedChaosHomestead

 

[BlessedChaosHomestead]

Fertrell provides what is essentially a Vitamin premix used by those making their own feed to ensure they cover the vitamins, trace minerals, and metals which may or may not be present in adequate amounts in their agricultural products. Think of it as "insurance" against vitamin/mineral deficiencies.

Unless your birds are showing symptoms of those deficiencies, no reason to think adding Fertrell's will benefit anyone but Fertrell and their retailer.

Fertrell ALSO has a pre-Mix w/ added Methionine (synthetic, dl-Methionine, allowed for use in "organic" feeds). Since Met is an Amino acid, its both a crude protein booster AND a booster of the most critical amino acid in chicken development. Using that product may well improve rate of weight gain, eventual adult size, and a host of lesser metrics. There is legislation limiting the amount of synthetic Met allowed over the lifetime of a bird for commercial flocks, but assuming that doesn't apply to you, its not an issue.

That said, you are probably better off (and cheaper) simply buying a better feed from Tucker Milling than a bare bones layer formulation (slightly better than some, but still, essentially generic "layer"), Have you looked at their Show Flock line of feeds? TM Show FLock Layer 22. TM Show Flock Starter. etc...

We use that line because of the non-gmo/soy/corn benefits. So I’ve not use their other lines.
Why I went to Kalmbach’s non-gmo line. A little more on price but I am liking the results.

I do agree it’s bare bones in layer feed. I mean it does the “job”, but I think my girls could do with better at times because of feather quality.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

I have a lot of posts on why Soy is so important in a typical chicken feed. Not because I'm pro-Soy. Because chickens are pro-Methionine. And soy meal is the best, reasonably priced, plant source for Methionine in quantity. (Corn Gluten Meal is also very good). Remove those two options and its very difficult to formulate a good feed without using either significant animal/fish/insect protein (which I'd like to see the industry do more of) and/or synthetic Met.

...and of course its hard to get organic non-gmo non-plant proteins at good price.

But yes, understand completely why you didn't go w/ the TM Show Flock line under those circumstances. The Kalmbach is good feed, you should be pleased.

 

[BlessedChaosHomestead]

I have a lot of posts on why Soy is so important in a typical chicken feed. Not because I'm pro-Soy. Because chickens are pro-Methionine. And soy meal is the best, reasonably priced, plant source for Methionine in quantity. (Corn Gluten Meal is also very good). Remove those two options and its very difficult to formulate a good feed without using either significant animal/fish/insect protein (which I'd like to see the industry do more of) and/or synthetic Met.

...and of course its hard to get organic non-gmo non-plant proteins at good price.

But yes, understand completely why you didn't go w/ the TM Show Flock line under those circumstances. The Kalmbach is good feed, you should be pleased.

Honestly, if I could find a feed that is affordable that had organic soy/corn, I wouldn't care. Especially if coupled with some animal protein. But I'm not sure that even exists. lol Like a unicorn there.