medicated chick feed?????

[Gypsy07]

lorain's fids :

I didn't know they could pick up something from the dirt--so now that is something to consider ....
I have only a bit left of the medicated feed and the chicks are 9 weeks old--so maybe it is better to get another bag of the medicated feed and keep them on it for awhile longer.

Feeding them the medicated crumbs should give them an immunity long after they have stopped eating it. Like getting a vaccination.

You should also think about the varying nutrition in crumbles/growers/layers pellts, cause that's important to get right as well. Chick crumbs are recommended for up to 4-8 weeks, and after that you should put them on growers feed till they're fully grown and ready to start laying. You can fudge it a bit depending on how much food you have left cause obviously you don't want to waste any, but if they've nearly finished their medicated crumbles and they're 9 weeks old, I'd say you should get them onto growers feed now instead of buying another bag of crumbles.

Just my opinion, of course...​

 

[Redberry]

How does each chicken know which food they are supposed to eat? I mean, my day old chick is in the run with mum, how do I make sure each gets what they need?

 

[Tiss]

Quote:
And that is why I only feed it for 3 weeks. I keep my chicks and mama in a small coop in the run of my big coop for their first few weeks (they have access to the soil at this point). They continue to sleep there until mama teaches them to roost in the big coop. As long as they are separated, I give them the medicated crumble and then leave the medicated stuff locked in their coop with them for overnights.

After 3 weeks, I've been letting mama and the babies hang out with the rest of the flock and I don't want my layers to eat the medicated feed. So I mix up a concoction of layer pellets, grower crumbles and oyster shell. Everyone seems to be getting what she needs.

Perhaps you should be feeding it longer, but this has been working for us. I'm on my third brood of chicks this summer and none of them have gotten ill.

 

[Fred's Hens]

Quote:
Which is why they sell "Flock Raiser" or "All Flock". It is a one-size-fits-all feed. The others are more specifically targeted.

 

[Gypsy07]

Yeah, it's difficult if you have a broody raising the babies herself. I was thinking more of the ideal feeding situation where you're raising chicks separately from any other chickens. If possible, I feed crumbles till maybe 6 weeks, then growers till they start laying. But right now I've got three chicks being raised by a broody in the main coop, and of course the older ones all like to push the chicks away and steal the chickie feed and then the chicks fly up to the big feeder and steal the layers mash. Gah! My way round that is to let the chicks out to free range half an hour before the rest, and sprinkle some growers pellets on the ground for them. Then through the day I'll do it again and stand guard over them for ten minutes to make sure they don't get chased off the food by the older birds. I'm probably kidding myself on that my efforts are making any nutritional difference to them, but the other fabulous result of it is that the chicks are now incredibly friendly and come sprinting over to me any time they see me walking about the yard, cause they see me as some sort of grand feeder/protector type...

 

[Redberry]

Thanks for all that, it does help. I am in the uk so I dont know about flock raiser, maybe there's a similar product here - I will investigate. With one hen and one baby, is there any problem with mum eating only chick crumb? I don't mind the expense as its only her, but will she get enough nutrition?

 

[Gypsy07]

I'm not sure, but my broody ate nothing but chick crumbs for the first fortnight after her chicks hatched and she looked great on it. No loss of condition, nothing like that. As they're not laying eggs while they're still brooding their chicks, I don't suppose they really need to be eating layers feed during that time....