Rooster Booster added to mash

[HeatherKellyB]

Hello friends! I make my chickens a mash every night, my five pullets that are 34 weeks old have been getting Nutrena Hearty Hen that is made into a mash with water. My Bachelor Flock that is 38 weeks old and my mixed flock that is 20 and 21 weeks old get Purina Flock Raiser moistened with water. Every other day, or every few days, I stir in a really tiny pinch of Rooster Booster Vitamins & Electrolytes with Lacto Bacillus. I started doing it because we're having some wierd temperatures here in NC. Last week, I was worrying about frozen waterers and this week, some of my birds are panting a little bit (not a lot or enough to be concerned about, I truly believe it's the extreme change in weather, but I started the Rooster booster before this) and I am refilling waterers with cold water. I wanted to make sure it was OK to mix this in their mash. They have access to pellet feed anytime they want it, so the mash is really just to make sure everyone is full before lock up. Thank you for your time

 

[HeatherKellyB]

This is an approximate amount I use in each bowl. The scoop I use for feed is 1 cup and it's almost full. So a tiny pinch is almost 1 cup of feed moistened to a mash. I mix this amount in each cup of mash I make.

 

[HeatherKellyB]

Just to show the size of the bowls I use. I placed next to a chick feeder, for reference

 

[HeatherKellyB]

@Wyorp Rock @azygous @Kiki @Eggcessive @EggSighted4Life I know I've only tagged a few of the highly educated and experienced, so please know that I appreciate every single one of you that help out so often in so many ways. BYC is the best site with even better members

 

[azygous]

My only concern would be the uniformity of the mixing. It's much easier to get the vitamin and electrolyte powder to mix evenly in water than it is to mix it evenly into wet food. Some chickens may be getting more and less than others with the wet mash.

Other than that, I don't see much downside to the way you are doing it.

 

[Kiki]

I think it might be better to give them warm water to drink.
I've never used the powdered version of this but I do use the liquid version.
I would not use it more than one time a week myself.

 

[Kiki]

My bad I didn't even answer your question... I would mix this with water first and then use that water to make the mash with.
I would not put the dry powder mixed with feed.

 

[Kiki]

One more thing... Electrolytes are not meant to be given daily... You can overdo it by offering this to them too much.

 

[HeatherKellyB]

Thank you both so much for the extremely helpful replies! I didn’t even think about the concerns brought up, but now this makes perfect sense. We're reaching the 70°F's this week. While this is typically the definition of perfect temperatures, in my opinion, it's a huge difference from having lows of 30°F just last week. I'm certainly not complaining, but I'm sure this has to be noticeable and possibly uncomfortable for chickens (not the temps, but the drastic changes). Then again, although I know that temperatures don't regulate egg laying in pullets, today was the very first day that I got 11 eggs from all 11 of my pullets. Thank you both so much. I think I'll hold off on the Rooster Booster, at least for now. I sincerely appreciate your time and advice

 

[Wyorp Rock]

I would mix it with water first, then add the feed to make the mash.
Personally, I would only add the vitamins once a week at most. I don't see any harm in what you are doing though, since the mash is offered up in addition to dry feed free choice.

Congratulations on all the eggs!