Raw Rice and Rice grains in feed

[dave3877]

the onmly urban myth ive seen come true is pendulum sexing with birds (i.e. a string and a pencil hovering over a bird) and cola dissolving a nail. takes about a week or 2 but ive seen it happen. had to try it

 

[Serrin]

Yeah, I know this thread is nearly three years old, but it deserves a bump, as it totally answered my question and put my fears at ease! Once again, BYC members to the rescue!

My well meaning DH gave the chooks uncooked rice this evening and I just about went ballistic.....well, actually, I did go ballistic. Now I owe him a huge apology!

Normally, I'm a very rational and reasonably intelligent person. But for years I have bought into the exploding bird myth. Aw geeze! I sure wish I'd had the time to read this thread before I went AK-47 Postal on his butt!! Does anyone have a good recipe for Crow?!? I think I'm going to have to choke down a big old hunk of Crow Pie now!

But at least I know my babies are going to be just fine. Thanks BYC members! You're always there with a rational answer when I need one!

 

[NanaRose]

I have read a lot of posts that said rice wasn't good for chickens. This really concerned me when a relative gave me 100lbs of rice from a feed mill. I haven't fed it to my chickens yet because I was afraid that I would kill them if I fed them the rice.

A local feed store introduced me to some feed that had corn, pellets, sunflower seeds, rice and a few other grains and assured me that the rice would not harm them. When I saw the rice I got scared but I did throw a handful out to them and they went crazy for the grains.

So it's ok to feed rice is what I'm hearing.

Can you tell me the name of the feed with those ingredients? I would appreciate a feed without wheat. Thanks.

 

[NanaRose]

We live in rice country here in southeast Arkansas too. You can go down to the river to the grain elevator where they load dried rice on to the barges. There's frequently a spill or two you can shovel up. I have several garbage cans full of it. I have to slap my hands to keep me from throwing out too much cuz they love it!

Envy for your location! Appreciate this thread. I and another in the house have celiac disease, another gluten-intolerant. We have a totally gluten-free home. Too risky for me to feed regular commercial chicken feed because of all the wheat & barley in it. My first ever chicks are now 3 weeks old and living on a recipe of feed I've made from reading on the web. Corn is the major ingredient but rice cereal, too, in both the dry feed and the mash I make. The chicks aren't dead yet. I tried whole brown rice at first, but the babies seemed to find it too big. Still refining my preferences. I tried cooking brown rice for them this evening, but my effort was a sad failure. It was so gummy. I make white basmati rice with no trouble at all, but I don't think that has all the nutrients of brown rice.

As for all this touting that rice is less nutritious-- our country is the only one in the world that relies on wheat. This happened at the turn of the 1900s, when the government pushed farming in the 'wheat belt'. In a documentary, I learned that the government even had signs put up in eastern cities reading: 'Eat more bread'. The wheat lobby is strong and has good publicity.