My husband brought home a 1940s John Deer Hammer Mill and wants me to make our own chicken feed. Help?!

[buckock]

My husband brought home a functional 1940s hammer mill. We have a flock of 50-100 chicken (depending on the time of year) and would like to mill our feed. I know that chickens' nutritional needs are complicated and vary by age, breed, and species. I also know that the process of milling changes some chemistries.

Anyone have a good recommendation where to start (or better yet some experience to learn from)? Yes, it came with a belt and we have a 1952 Ferguson to drive it. We are also have neighbors with various crop gleanings and can access basic ingredients including wheat, soy, corn, and oats. Soooo... where do I begin?

 

[Brooks_]

Tell him to do it. Pick up some formulated feed while you wait.

 

[TooCheep]

Youtube is your friend for learning obscure things:

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=john+deere+hammer+mill

 

[buckock]

Tell him to do it. Pick up some formulated feed while you wait.

That wouldn’t be fair. He indulges my chicken habit and I indulge his antique engine habit. It’s more fun to challenge each other.

 

[Acre4Me]

That wouldn’t be fair. He indulges my chicken habit and I indulge his antique engine habit. It’s more fun to challenge each other.

In this forum, do a search for homemade feed, etc. there are others who have gone down this path….well, the path of blending feed, maybe not milling it! But, still, there have been good discussions on nutritional requirements, and proper blends and ratios of various ingredients etc.

 

[Cindy in PA]

There are recipes at Fertrell.com that are good. There should be more floating around by them then they have on their site now. I did this 12 years ago, buying the grains, Nutri balancer & calcium from a local Mennonite farmer that makes Fertrell feed recipes. I did it because his feed was too ground up for my liking. In my opinion chickens like the whole grains more than when they are pulverized, YMMV

 

[Red-Stars-in-RI]

You could buy pellets, then crush them into crumble using the mill.

 

[raingarden]

Wow. You're really lucky to find it. Pictures? You'll also need a way to steam heat the mixture and then extrude it into crumbles or pellets and dry them. An old Califonia pellet mill would be perfect.

 

[Folly's place]

By the time you buy and store the grains, and the necessary supplements (which have a limited shelf life) and then handle and store the ground feed, it's going to be more expensive, and MUCH more work. And, actually getting each batch analyzed (which should be done) is another expense.
We often have similar numbers of birds (not this year) and i still buy feed by the bag. If we had 100 adult laying hens, buying 300 to 500 pounds of feed at once would make sense, because there would likely be a discount. Then at least we don't have rodent proof storage space for that much!
Mary

 

[Folly's place]

Used to be that grain came in 100 lb. bags, which at least I could never have handled. Still true, or can it come in 50 pound bags?
Mary