Okay so really need advice

I don't know what options you have for feed in your area. You may have a co-op, a Tractor Supply, or something else. Not all Tractor Supplies carry the same optjons for chicken feed anyway. There is no way I can tell you what your options are in your area. You'll need to look around, maybe in the yellow pages. I don't have any trouble finding chick Starter or Grower without medication, but I don't know your options.

The calcium in Layer can harm the chicks. There are plenty of studies that prove that. If you want, I can give you some links. The damage can be to the internal organs or even the bone development. A lot of the time, that organ damage does not kill them but weakens them for the rest of their lives. But it is not so much the percentage of calcium in the feed as how much total calcium they eat in a day. If all they get is Layer, that is enough to hurt them. If they free range most of the day and forage for the vast majority of their food, they may not get enough calcium to hurt them. These things are not always as clearcut as you are sometimes led to believe.

I still do not feed Layer to any of my chickens when I have young ones around. I feed them all the same thing and offer oyster shell on the side. The ones that need the calcium for the egg shells will get it and the rest usually won't eat enough to do themselves any damage.

Chicks do not absolutely have to have Starter to grow well. They will grow faster and feather out faster if they are in the higher protein feed, but in the long term, their overall health will not suffer if the protein level is a little lower or higher than optimum. I do feed Starter the first 4 weeks, but after that switch to Grower. The times I cannot get Starter, they might get 16% Grower or 20% Flock Raiser. When I can't get 16% Grower, they probably get 20% Flock Raiser. It's not that critical, especially if they do much free ranging or foraging.

If you are running a commercial operation where you are trying to squeeze the utmost efficiency out of chicks by feeding them Starter, Grower, Developer, and Layer in the correct progression and the commercial feed is all they eat, then it is more important to your bottom line. But for most of us, following an exact regimen is not that critical as long as we don't go too far overboard either direction. My only rigid rule for myself is to not feed excess calcium to growing chicks. Other than that, I am pretty flexible, though I stay away from the really high protein feeds. I feel that too much of a good thing is not necessarily a good thing.

Here are those links to a couple of studies on feeding chicks Layer from Day 1.

Avian Gout
http://en.engormix.com/MA-poultry-i.../avian-gout-causes-treatment-t1246/165-p0.htm

British Study – Calcium and Protein
http://www.2ndchance.info/goutGuoHighProtein+Ca.pdf
 

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