New Chicken Owner

[Kyleharry16]

Please help me if you can. I never have had any chickens and I was going to order some Gold Sex Link Chickens. 30 Pullets and 5 Cockerels. I would like to know just how much feed should they consume in a day? week? month? (each and they will be cooped with no table scrapes) Thanks for any help you can give.

-Kyle

 

[allieloveschickens]

hopefully someone with more chickens than I have will come help you out, but I have five hens and they go through 6lbs of feed every 6-7 days- but that is in addition to free ranging and occasional treats- bread, blueberries, lettuce, etc. So cooped up they will consume more feed.

 

[Kyleharry16]

Thanks that gives me a better idea then I had before!

 

[Flawedatdesign]

I have 7 Red sex link hens that are 2 years old. With 2 roos Plus the other 6 mixed bantie hens I have I can get about 2 weeks without them free ranging and 3 weeks with them free ranging out of 50 lbs of feed.

Now I have 10 SLW that eat about 5 lbs week as they are just chicks.

 

[Fred's Hens]

There is no point in buying little bitty bags of feed, when there are so many hungry mouths.

Too expensive.

Feeding 30-35 adult birds will take a 50# bag of feed every 12 days. Making two weeks would be generous.
As chicks, you'll be able to get them to point of lay on approximately 5-6, 40# bags of starter/grower.

Curious as to why you ordered some roos? Meat? Being sex links, any future breeding would produce a hodge-podge of mutts. But, you probably already know that.

 

[Kyleharry16]

Oh I did not know that. So would it be better to get a different breed so I chould breed them in the future or just stick with the Gold Sex Link and take away the roos. I just need a breed of chicken that lays a lot of eggs and prefer a breed I could breed but if they can't that is prefectly fine.
Thanks-
Kyle

 

[Flawedatdesign]

Well the Sex Links are heavy layers. But you get mutts from the eggs. But wouldn't the Mutts ne good layers too? I not sure what the cross is of the Gold Sex link

 

[carrlr]

I'll start out by saying mutts lay eggs too. Any sexlink has been bred for a specific reason, which is to tell the sex and the point of hatch. This characteristic is not passed on via breeding. Most of those breeds are used for egg production. If you're looking for a breed that will in-turn breed and get you more birds you should look for something that goes broody often, like an Orpington. However, your going to be giving up some egg produciton. IMO my Buff Orpington's don't lay as much, or as large of eggs as my Red Sex Links. On a side note, my Barred Rocks are consitant layers, but I've never had one go broody. Just for the sake of the flock, I'd go with one or two Roos. A good roo can be protective, especially if you planned to free range. AS to your original question. I have ten adult birds who go through a 50# bag in about two weeks. The adulds get an abundance of scraps and have some free range time. I also have ten 10-week olds that go through about 50# in a two week period also. But, this is about 98% of the ration.