Scheduled feeding instead of free feeding

[Dekthai818]

trap mice, can you hang food and water higher?

 

[azygous]

Fermenting your feed, feeding twice a day, about half a cup per chicken daily, you are eliminating waste, leaving zero feed on the ground, improving the nutritional levels in your flock, and saving real money on your feed bill.

I have a mice problem, also. But even worse, I have a bear problem. Any food left in the run at night invites bears to tear up the run to get at it. If I only had to deal with mice, it would be a pleasure. Fermenting my feed freed me from having to carry the feeders inside at night and drag them back out in the morning.

Now I just carry a bowl of FF out to the run in the morning and again in the afternoon, and it's no work at all. I haven't had any bears, and the mice don't even seem to be as much of a problem as they were.

And the bonus is that I'm getting eggs from some very old hens that I thought would never lay again.

 

[starchicky]

These are all great suggestions, thanks! We did try some live traps for a bit, but there are too many mice. Their feed bags are ok in a metal trash can, but it's the feeder the mice get into and leave droppings, etc. I've been wanting to try fermented feed, this sounds like a good time to do it. We are building new grandpa feeders this weekend. I'm curious to learn more about checking their crop to see how much they are eating and how much to feed them, etc. When I think bach, I have seen the mice get caught by the chickens during the day, so they must be out during the day. We did set up a night camera at one point and they were everywhere at night though.

 

[lazy gardener]

They are everywhere because of the bonanza of feed available to them. In order to rid your area of them, you are going to need to go on an extended trapping or poisoning mission as well as being sure they have no access to feed set out for chickens or feed in storage.