@q8peafowl ,just when you think you have things figured out everything takes a dump on you. This year has been my worst as far as hatching and fertile eggs goes. It's not the peas fault and I do't think it was my feed,as it's the same ration I had used last year with way above average results compared to years previous. It was our weather here in central Illinois in June and early July. We had over 24"s of rain in June and over 12" the first two weeks of July.Only had about 6 sunny days in June total. The rest was cloudy and rain. For 3 days in a row my birds didn't come down off their perches because of steady rain. Then the pens had water sitting in them.It was a mess and of course now the weather pattern is back to what we expect here in late July,,hot and muggy. But also the males trains started dropping 2 weeks ago so breeding is over for 2015.
Corn is a low cost feedstuff but at only arounf 7-9% protein it's nowhere a complete cureall.Corn is great during very cold months for redily absorbed energy. My peas are picky at the feedbowl. Everything they need to eat for a balanced ration they leave behind. Such as alfalfa meal which I add for B vitamins since mine do not free range. Fish meal also was left behind because I think it tasted strange or the smell wasn't to their liking. I just got a fresh ton of feed this morning and we are trying alfalfa pellets in this mix.
I "upped" my trace minerals and vitamins 15% in this ration to help the males with the stress of losing their trains and feather regrowth. I have the answer to these finicky eaters and that is to completely pelletize their ration. It would first need to be ground fine then ran thru a pelletizer. After that is done the feed needs CLE or Molasses added to hide the smell of whats inside the pellets and if the peas can actually taste their feed the sweetness on the outside of each pellet should entice them to eat the feed.
Hubbard makes a 24% crumble but a ton is over $745,,a ton of my feed at current corn-soybean-milo-millet-black oil sunflower seed prices is just at $425 and this will last me for 3 months.
I have considered peanuts but whats available here is still inside the shell and I don't know if the peas would know to break the shell open to get the peanut inside but the protein level around 45% is high. I've looked into what the peas needs nutrition wise for many years,,called several top nutritionalists that works for diffrent manutacturers such as Nutrena and Hubbard and Kent but if the birds won't eat it all this is for nothing.
