Making your own feed, where to buy grains?

[cicene mete]

Hi there everybody in BYC land. Someone earlier post a link to some chicken feed recipes http://www.greenerpasturesfarm.com/ChickenFeedRecipe.html

My question is, where can you buy all of these grains? The recipe calls for corn, wheat, barley, oats, sunflower seeds, millet, kamut, split peas, lentils, quinoa, sesame, flax, & kelp. The recipe it links to is slightly better, it just calls for corn, soybeans, alfalfa, and oats. But I have no idea where to get any of this in large quantity.

I live in Western Massachusetts, and there are 3 feet stores relatively close to me, but they sell feed, I've never seen any giant bulk containers of individual grains there.

Any ideas??

 

[chookchick]

You could try calling all the feed stores around you, and seeing what they could special order for you. Unfortunately, they usually order these grains in 50 # bags, so if you are not feeding 100 chickens, it won't work very well for you. Some, you might be able to find at a local health food store, but expensive. I gave up on the idea of mixing my own feed for this very reason. There are also specialized ingredients you would need such as alfalfa meal, fish meal, vitamin mix, etc...that are hard to find in small amounts.

 

[pbwhit]

I follow that recipe with the kamut, quinoa, etc. and use bulk ingredients from my local food coop. The cost is definitely much higher than buying a huge bag of commercial feed, but I feel better giving them something real. Do you have a healthfood store nearby or a whole foods? I even found the kelp powder in my coops bulk herbs and spices dept. Good luck!

 

[Boyd]

buying at a grain elevator seems to be the cheepest way to go. We have one in Swartz Creek that (and I don't know if they still do) you could call in your order for Xamount of corn, Xamount of protein etc etc etc.

 

[hermiesbirdies]

I eat Quinoa, but I rinse it first to get the bitter outer coating off. Do you have to rinse quinoa for the birds?

 

[canada-goose]

Quote:
Nope. Chickens aren't picky.