Ouch, that's one expensive egg!

[HaikuHeritageFarm]

My feed is expensive, $30 per 50# bag, but I supplement heavily with scraps from the cafe I work at, weeds and cuttings from the garden (though these are about to be gone) and am contemplating buying a bunch of bulk peas to sprout for them every day over the winter. I have 13 birds right now and a bag lasts me about 3 weeks. So it costs me (rounding up!) .20 cents per day per bird to feed my birds. $2.60 per day....$18.20 per week. Rounding up again, we'll say they cost about $20 per week in feed. Now, only 5 of these birds are currently laying, and I'm only getting 3-4 eggs per day...we'll be generous and say I get 4 eggs per day on average, so I'm getting about 2.5 dozen eggs per week. That's about $8 per dozen!

This isn't including equipment or housing costs, initial purchase of the birds, time, electric for light/heat this winter, or other incidentals.

Other than picking one roo and getting rid of the other four (yes, I have 5 cockerels out of 13 birds,) what can I do to make this chicken math work out better in my favor? I get a quality feed, but am actually considering telling the chooks to suck it up and deal with the cheap stuff, especially since they get so many other goodies. I can get super cheap layer feed (15%, I think) at Wal-Mart for less than half the cost.

I also have an outlet for all the eggs I can get together for $4 per dozen. Would using cheaper feed and getting some more economical laying hens going actually reduce the cost of my hobby flock in the long run? Something in me tells me maybe chickens are like other things, and if you can have enough of them they're actually cheaper per unit?

 

[burntmuch]

I pay $8 for 40 lbs of lay feed, plus try to let the girls freerange at least 3 hours in the late afternoon. Ive got 9 layers & one teenage roo, that will never lay an egg. your 5 roos will never lay, so as far as feed goes their dead weight, I would pick out the one roo that you wanna keep & get rid of the others. replace them with a few more layers. My girls seem to do OK with the cheaper food. Good luck

 

[33yardbirds]

$30 a #50 bag ? Are they getting Baluga Caviar? I am getting Layena Pellets at TSC for $12.95 a #50 and they are laying machines. They also get the table scraps and BOSS and the old staple scratch. 16% on the pellets. I know you love your birds, but Geeez Louise .

 

[txcarl1258]

I also feed mine Layena pellets from TSC. Purina makes this feed and all of my birds have been fed Purina from day one. I would not feed them anything else and they are doing great!

 

[icemanchicken]

Your feed is really high, i also feed nutrena laying crumbles and it only cost me around 9.00 a bag. Lately ive been doing a 60/40 split with that and crack corn which is only 7.00 a bag with no change in the amount of eggs that i get.

 

[Clay Valley Farmer]

Not sure where you shop that feed is $30 for 50lb, yikes!

Up here anyway it is good to stay away from places that sell pet food. TSC is not much better (here anyway Canada). Local feed store stores are far less expensive.

I was just looking at waters and lights too, TSC wanted nearly $60 for a 5 gal plastic water $50 for a feeder. Feed store was just a hair over half that price, but TSC was better on fencing. Got to shop around, they all try to get you in on one thing and make the money on another. LMAO a 50' role of 1/4" wire mesh was $30 and a 100' role was $99.99 so much for for getting a bulk deal. Watch the suppliers like a halk!

Paying about $18-$20 for 90lb here give or take depending on which layer, grower, raiser...

 

[Mahonri]

Layena is $16 here. I guess we have to pay for shipping.

Egg Maker is $14.

I mix the two.

 

[crj]

Wow, that's some expensive feed. I use Nutrena layer pellets and that's about $12. I also feed mine scratch and BOSS. They free range during the day as well. My girls lay well although some of my girls have gotten pretty old but are hanging in there with the egg laying.

Maybe some of you that have to order feed can talk to your hardware store person. Maybe they can order several bags at a time and you can buy through them. It might be a lot cheaper that way. It seems you don't have a feed store near you.

 

[PortageGirl]

GUYS!!! Did you look at where Anarchy is from?

Alaska.

Purina does not have a feed production mill up there, it all gets trucked up, or shipped up in container ships then trucked out to wherever Anarchy lives. Ya'll are just spoiled! I lived up there for 7 years, and while the cost of living isn't as high as some may think, it's still high, and something like chicken feed which doesn't exactly have a big market, is never going to be cheap.

 

[Stevo]

I use Southern States from Agway. 7 bux for 50lb bag of layers crumbles. My birds freerange and eat about 50lbs a month.