I am confused about what feed to give my hens. In your opinion what is better, layer pellets or layer crumbles? Why?
Well I honestly feed my girls both !! Not because i want to.... When I go out to fill their feeder, they have pecked and pecked until about half the feeder tray has crumbles and the other half is pellet.. Sooooo I guess they will make it what they want. i also throw in a slice of fresh alfalfa hay every now and then and they get a cup or so each of scratch every couple days. They are not free range so i try to give em a variety when I can. They always get the fresh veggie scraps I have, ie.. broccoli stems, lettuce, tomatoes, any veggie thats fresh.. I also got to my little local grocery store and they clean out their produce isle and put the soon to be bad veggies out back and I help myself. Not always a good source but some days.. its a great find. But I also agree...... If you only feed them pellets...... they WILL eat them. hunger is a funny thing. lol
I agree with the others. I feed strictly pellets and have saved quite a bit of money from the lack of waste.
First of all, if you are buying the feed from the same manufacturer the feed should be exactly the same between the pellet and the crumble. Read the tag to confirm this though. Every crumble is made into a pellet before it becomes a crumble. A crumble is made by either running the pellet through a crumblizer or simply by cutting the pellets short when it comes out of the pellet die. When comparing feed consumption you need to compare weight or full bags consumed, not how full the feeder is because of differences in bulk density of the two types of feed. Feeding a pellet should reduce feed waste because of the lack of fines and small pieces that get pecked out of the feeder and wasted in the bedding. Jim
Pellets do make less waste that said i do know my girls like the crumb better but they piggyback feed with my ducks which suck with crumbs so we're back to pellets for everyone.
I feed crumbles because my birds absolutely hated the pellets, especially my tiny bantams. Went back to crumbles, happy hens again. I actually have less waste with the crumbles then I did with pellets. They shoveled the pellets out and did not pick them up. With the crumbles there is no shoveling out, only gobbling up. My feeder sits on a large, flat piece of wood and the hens clean up any crumbles that fall out. So I would say try both, see what you and your birds like best.
