Paleo chickens

bridgetveuleman

Hatching
6 Years
Sep 1, 2013
2
0
7
I follow a paleo diet. For those of you that are not familiar it is no dairy, soy, grains, or corn products. I would like my chickens to follow the same diet. Any ideas for feed?
 
Greetings from Kansas and
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! Pleased you joined us! Sorry, I don't have any advice on that type of chicken diet either. But I wish you well in your search.
 
Why do you feel it would be unhealthy? What nutritional value do corn and grains have that chickens need? A healthy human diet is protein, vegetables, and some fruit. Why would that not be healthy for chickens? Thanks for the input!
 
Paleo chickens scare me - what if they pulled a revolt? Attack of the velociraptors.
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Modified Paleo diet for me - grain diet for my birds.
 
Chickens at one time basically lived of corn and grain, along with grass and insects. All complete feeds contain grains, and corn is a source of carbs and protein, they need it on cold days to stay warm.

Chickens live off corn and grain because it is a cheap thing to feed them not because it is ideal nutrition, and the idea of corn "warming" birds seems more like a often repeated wives tail than anything else. Do you have any actually scientific information about this? If so I would love to read it but I have never been able to find any. They certainly do not NEED corn.

I have definitely seen farmers at farmers markets selling "grain-free" eggs. They do this by feeding a pastured or fodder-based diet so they are being feed grains as greens/grasses rather than as grains if that makes sense. The nutrition difference is huge and with fodder you can turn 1 lb of grains into 6 + lbs of greens/grasses.

I think that if you did enough research into nutritional needs/balance and worked it all out so they are getting the right protein, calcium and amno acids I think it could be an amazing diet. Likely much better than a standard commercial diet -- I am not sure what your costs would be. That could be an issue.

I feed a corn-free, soy-free organic feed with a fish meal base and then grow my own organic wheat/barley/BOSS fodder and noticed a big different in feather quality and egg yolk quality versus commercial soy based feed. You can also farm your own meal worms for very easy, very cheap high quality protein.

I would love to know what you end up going with!

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/713334/growing-fodder-for-chickens
 
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