Shadrach's Ex Battery and Rescued chickens thread.

[BDutch]

I am feeling better about switching to insect based chicken feed - I didn’t even know it would have a better carbon footprint.

There is another pro in insect proteins compared with soy from Brazil. This is GMO soy in general , and GMO soy contains poisons. So much that it isn’t allowed for human feed.
But gov. institutes don’t mind if chickens (and other animals) get poisoned as long as the chickens don’t drop dead before they are 2 years old (end of commercial life) and the residues in the eggs and meat are not too high for human consumption.

Edited spelling/typos

 

[BDutch]

At least the feed I get they say the larvae are fed on pre-consumer waste - which I think one of you explained to me is the food that doesn’t make it to the supermarkets - like the ugly veggies or whatever they are called.

Its also waste from the supermarkets. Al fresh food that isn’t sold in time.
(At least in my country.)

 

[RoyalChick]

I see there's a newish article on giving chicks treats...which includes fatuous comments on feeding them bread......dare I swim against the tide (in Shad's wonderful phrase) of a project manager no less?

When times were tough during the French Revolution (and no doubt in other stressed times and places), chalk was added to bread to make up the bulk cheaply. I don't know how many of you have noticed from the spreadsheet how high CaCo3 comes in the relative order of ingredients in many bags of chicken feed. That's calcium carbonate, or limestone. Yes it supplies calcium, which layers need, to some extent. It also bulks out the feed, as chalk did bread. Hopefully bread doesn't have chalk in it now. Wouldn't it be nice to know what % of modern commercial chicken feed is limestone?

In my fancy insect protein feed (grower) ground limestone is the 8th ingredient. I don’t know the percentage but they must be listed in order of amount (volume, mass, no idea). That probably isn’t too bad because the long list of ingredients after have lots of ‘micro’ needs like selenium.
The regular grower has calcium carbonate listed fourth but it may be the same because that is the one that says ‘grains’ without specifying!
Grower is a good one to look at as they have to keep a low total calcium.
I don’t see the article - can you link it tell me where to find it (I did see one but no mention of bread).
I assume bread is bad? My friend who helps me with construction - fixing rotten siding on the barn right now - always shares his lunchtime sandwich with my chickens. He has such a lovely relationship with them (they gather round and have a chat) that I don’t have the heart to tell him not to. I am guessing it isn’t enough to be an issue.

 

[RoyalChick]

There is another pro in insect proteins compared with soy from Brazil. This is GMO soy in general and contains poisons. Do much that it isn’t allowed for human feed.
But gov. institutes don’t mind if chickens (and other animals) get poisoned as long as the chickens don’t drop dead before they are 2 yesrs old (end of commercial life) and the residues in the eggs and meat are not to high for human consumption.

I think while I can afford it I will stick with this non-soy, good waste eating insect stuff. One day I may try growing the bugs myself but I can’t focus on that right now.

 

[Marie2020]

I am feeling better about switching to insect based chicken feed - I didn’t even know it would have a better carbon footprint.

I know nothing about this. Lots to learn here

 

[GregnLety]

I know nothing about this. Lots to learn here

Me too Marie. We try to feed our as best as possible given our budget and available feeds.

 

[BDutch]

In my fancy insect protein feed (grower) ground limestone is the 8th ingredient. I don’t know the percentage but they must be listed in order of amount (volume, mass, no idea). That probably isn’t too bad because the long list of ingredients after have lots of ‘micro’ needs like selenium.
The regular grower has calcium carbonate listed fourth but it may be the same because that is the one that says ‘grains’ without specifying!
Grower is a good one to look at as they have to keep a low total calcium.
I don’t see the article - can you link it tell me where to find it (I did see one but no mention of bread).
I assume bread is bad? My friend who helps me with construction - fixing rotten siding on the barn right now - always shares his lunchtime sandwich with my chickens. He has such a lovely relationship with them (they gather round and have a chat) that I don’t have the heart to tell him not to. I am guessing it isn’t enough to be an issue.

Bread is not really bad imho. I give it to my chickens too if it gets dry (never much). It has to much salt to be healthy. But the yeast is no problem and the grain (wheat mostly) is in the feed and the scratch too.

 

[TheFatBlueCat]

I feed my chickens all food scraps which does include all the stale bread and crusts from the ends of loaves. Other than bread it's mostly vegetable/fruit/meat scraps and plate scrapings after meals have finished.
I'm not going to claim this makes for the best diet ever, however this is one main reason WHY people have chickens, at least in my country. If you told someone they shouldn't feed their chickens food waste they would look at you like you're a crazy person.
I also feed my flock a lot of apples and kiwifruit because I get it for free. For sure this must unbalance their 'healthy balanced commercial diet' but I'm doing what I've always done, what I was taught to do as a child, and we had hens that lived over 8 years when I was a kid. Some of those hens we had when I was a child lived only on food scraps, grass, weeds from the garden, and wheat.

 

[Ladies-Eight]

Yes. Great news. Thanks for sharing.
I do have a few questions.

1. What means free ranging in this situation? In my country this doesn’t mean they have much space nor that the chickens can go outside.
2. What is the difference between ordinary mealworms and the black soldier fly larvae?

And I wonder why almost everyone on BYC likes to abbr. everything. Like BSFL meaning black soldier fly larvae. I find it often hard and sometimes even impossible to understand them. In my country we learn that you have to give the full name first with the abbreviation (abbr.) between brackets the first time you use the abbr. That makes it so much easier to understand.

I did notice that the (dried) mealworms in the shop are not as expensive as a few years ago. Probably because there are more farmers who stepped into this business.

I agree about the abbreviations as it is hard to understand what they are saying.

I'm so glad I'm not the only one this happens to.

 

[BDutch]

Today I altered the tiny broody coop a little so Kraai can roost/ sleep in it. It has lots of ventilation now.

And we made progress with the integration.

Work in progress
Today I worked on the old broody coop.
I remodelled Kraai’s mini-coop. Now she can roost.

I made the coop a little higher. Added ventilation under the glass ceiling. And added a real perch at a height of about 20 cm.
View attachment 3208965
About 2 cm in the back and 7 cm in front.

View attachment 3208967
You can see the roost inside the coop.

I want to add a piece of EPDM or some wood (WRC) in the front. This gives her some shelter if its raining a lot.

Integrating with the flock
As long as I worked on the coop, I opened up the ‘gate’ between the two runs.

After a while the headmistress Ini mini came to pay a visit. The two ended up fighting like chicks often do (bumping chests) . No harm. Ini mini went back to the 1st run/ the flock.

Later Kraai went to the 1st run. She stayed out of sight behind the laurel. But guess who spotted her? And gues what happened?
Black attacked her and she tried to defend herself at first. I could call Kraai from behind the small gate. And she listened .

After finishing the job with the tiny coop I closed the gate again. Time for a snack, left over from diner (spaghetti with veggies and soy beans).

Things are going quit well.

I made a new thread for Kraai. :
https://www.backyardchickens.com/th...hicken-to-an-established-flock.1541585/page-2