Never stop!!!!!

[cherrynberry]

This is almost an emergency!! I have been feeding a flock of 15 chickens 20 cups of layer and grower for the rooster, this is more than double of what I had heard chickens eat. Awhile ago, I made the mistake of buying 3 50lb bags of layer feed with only 16% protein. This caused hens to get picked on, that is solved now, but they still never stop eating! Due to the protein lack, I feed them extra eggshells, some grower feed (it has 20% protein), flax (1 cup a day), mealworms (1 cup a day), eggs (about 2 scrambled per day), as well as grit and scratch..

I know nothing else is eating their food as I watch until they finish it, to let my rooster out (I trap him alone in the coop until he finishes his 1 cup of grower feed...I have no idea what we are doing wrong.

 

[cherrynberry]

We feed Purina layer feed, usually 20% protein, but now 16% and even when they were on 20% they also don’t stop eating!

Update: today the chickens ate a total of 20 cups of food regardless of flax and eggs.

 

[MadamContrary]

Spring moult? How old are they?
Edit to add, I remember being advised a full grown hen will eat 1 1/2 cups a day, if not free ranged. Secondly when did you last deworm?

 

[cherrynberry]

Spring moult? How old are they?

All 1 year old except the wyandottes

 

[cherrynberry]

Spring moult? How old are they?

They are not moulting

 

[MadamContrary]

They are not moulting

I was editing with more questions while you were replying, sorry.

 

[Cecisflock]

Could they not be absorbing the nutrients?

 

[cherrynberry]

Spring moult? How old are they?
Edit to add, I remember being advised a full grown hen will eat 1 1/2 cups a day, if not free ranged. Secondly when did you last deworm?

We last dewormed 2 months ago, and they are free ranged. Also I said they eat 20 cups, but 15 of those cups are dry feed and 5 cups are fermented so the fermented feed comes to about 15 cups, so they are eating much more at about 30 cups


edit: that’s 30 cups in all not even including 1 cup of flax, 1 cup of mealworms, and 1 cup of scratch/ lots of grit

 

[cherrynberry]

Could they not be absorbing the nutrients?

Is there a way to fix this? They are so expensive to feed everyday!

 

[MadamContrary]

We last dewormed 2 months ago, and they are free ranged. Also I saw they eat 20 cups, but 15 of those cups are dry feed and 5 cups are fermented so the fermented feed comes to about 15 cups, so they are eating much more at about 30 cups


edit: that’s 30 cups in all not even including 1 cup of flax, 1 cup of mealworms, and 1 cup of scratch/ lots of grit

Yeah that's about 3x the average for free ranged large fowl daily per bird. That's a bit of a puzzler. Perhaps switch over to 100% fermented feed and grow the scratch into fodder or sprout it to make it more nutritionally available. Could just be that it's spring, seems like all the animals go into overdrive in spring.