Official BYC Poll: Winterizing your flock's feed: Do you change or supplement it?

[BYC Project Manager]

As winter wears on, your flock produces fewer or no eggs. They're either still molting, or have just finished their last molt. As they take a break from their reproductive duties and shed their coats, winter is an excellent time for your chickens to replenish their nutrients and grow new feathers.

So when it comes to Winterizing your flock's feed: Do you change or supplement it? Please place your vote above, and elaborate in a reply below if you chose "Other".

Further Reading:

• Get Your Chickens Ready for Winter
• Top 5 Ways Of Keeping Your Flock Warm In Winter

(Check out more Official BYC Polls HERE!)

 

[Lacy Duckwing]

I keep their food the same year around. On very cold days, I sometimes will offer some warm oatmeal to warm them up some.

 

[nuthatched]

In the winter, I give them dark leafy greens and extra fruits and vegetables, with a little extra scratch.

 

[Lazy J Farms Feed & Hay]

Free Choice of a quality complete feed with clean water all the time.

 

[Sally PB]

I don't do anything different for their feed. But instead of making Chickie Snack with cool/cold water like in the warm months, I make it with warm water. Chickie Snack is the fines of their food (which they don't eat) wetted into a mash.

 

[K0k0shka]

I feed them 20% protein flock raiser year round. The only thing I do differently in the winter is what Sally described - I make them a mash out of their regular feed, but with hot water (either the fines, or the crumble if there are no fines currently).

Ironically, my chickens only get to graze on grass in the winter. I don’t free range and they aren’t allowed in the garden during the growing season, but I plant winter wheat in it in the fall, and it stays fresh and green all winter. That’s when I let the chickens into the garden (it’s fenced and covered on top so they’re safe in there). In the warm months, I give them glass clippings from mowing, branches from shrubs they like, etc. so they still get greens, but it’s only in winter that they get to walk on grass and pick it themselves. Which is funny because winter in Boston is cold and dead, and among the snow there’s this oasis of green, with chickens in it

 

[Eden83_haaretz]

Well I hadn't thought of supplementing their feed. Although we do try and give them more fruits and they free range all the time. Although we don't live somewhere where there is snow, we do get frost everyonce a while so I'm definitely checking the article on how to prepare them for winter.

 

[Meri Maura]

I just give them more food, sometimes scratch

 

[GC-Raptor]

I keep them on the same feed free choice year round.
But they do get double Scratch Grains, 2 Tbsps daily per chicken compared to summer's 1 Tbsp daily.
I also buy a bale of Alfalfa hay for winter season and toss a flake into the pen or coop weekly to supplement the lack of greens. GC

 

[Meri Maura]

I keep them on the same feed free choice year round.
But they do get double Scratch Grains, 2 Tbsps daily per chicken compared to summer's 1 Tbsp daily.
I also buy a bale of Alfalfa hay for winter season and toss a flake into the pen or coop weekly to supplement the lack of greens. GC

Wow much more organized than i
But its hard to ne organized when you 90 pet chickens