Anyone have any opinions on which is better? What are the pros and cons of each? Do your chickens seem to prefer crumbles over pellets, or viceversa?
No preference as far as the chickens go, but I prefer the pellets , it seems as thought there is less waste.
My chickens prefer crumbles and my smallest bantams like the seramas and japanese either can't or completely refuse to eat pellets. Which is fine cause crumbles is all I can get at nearby stores. Pellets though will have less waste and cost you less in the end than crumbles.
All of mine like crumbles better. They seem to have more waste with pellets they scratch the pellets every where. I feel thcrumbles are easier for they to eat.
I have my layers on crumbles, my hybrids that I incubated are on crumbles from start to finish they are being raised for meat tho...
Much prefer the pellets, less waste. Any that they spill is easier for them to pick up off the floor.
Mine prefer crumbles. If I had made the switch to pellets when they first switched to layer feed, I think they would have taken to them better. I waited until they had been laying for about 6 months, then didn't realize that they weren't eating much of the pellets. I thought the feed was lasting longer because they weren't wasting as much. They free ranged daily, so got much of what they needed from the yard. Then I built them a pen, and the pellets still didn't seem to be getting eaten. Egg production dropped to nearly zero. I switched them back to crumbles, and, I'll be darned if egg production didn't go back to normal in about 3 weeks. That was in the summer. No one had been molting. NOW, they are molting, so egg production is down again. I will stick with crumbles. Switch to pellets early if you're going to do it.
For some of us with larger flocks waste is a big issue, so the pellets offer us a little savings, but they are better for large fowl, although my quail love them just as well. AL