I've suspected this for some time now. I suspected similar last winter but it wasn't as often. C is not feeding the chickens at the crack of dawn in the cold and dark as they have had people believe.
It's not really a problem with the current arrangement but I find the bullshit irritating and childish. On the days C starts work early they're coming back at lunchtime and feeding the geese and the chickens. Lunchtime seems to be between 1pm and 2pm.
I went to the allotments in the morning today. I was over that way seeing the eldest and husband. I did a crop check at a bit after 9am. They were all empty. It's just not possible for a chicken to fill it's crop at 7am and it be completely empty at 9am.
Then there's been the chickens lack of hunger when I arrive between 2pm and 3pm at the moment.
There is also the amount of feed left in the tray. If they've had 7 hours since their last feed unless C is has put in over 500 grams of pellets in their tray, which is very unlikely given how tight C is, there wouldn't be much left and that hasn't been the case.
When I've checked the chicken's crops on arrival on the days they have been fed in the morning they're almost empty by 2pm.
Sloppy science.
The nutritional requirements of a chicken are roughly goverend by their size and their egg laying capacity. More of either or both means more feed. The Red Sex Link, while bred to be a small hen needing less feed than an average dual purpose hen lays a lot eggs. The idea is a smaller high production breed will need less feed for itself and the feed will go towards the eggs. A larger hen laying the same amount of eggs as a RSL would need more feed due to their body weight.
Most feed manufacturers give a roug guide at between 100grams and 120 grams a day for production breeds. Large breeds might need 150 grams a day.
One can begin to understand when dealing with thousands of hens kept for egg production why smaller hens that need less feed are more economical and why the industry puts a lot of research into maximizing production from smaller hens.
For many keepers none of this is an issue because they leave feed available throughout the day. But, if one is feeding a limited quantity at intervals during the day as one might free rangers or under conditions where feed cant be left out on a permenant basis (rat problems for example) then how much one feeds at each sitting and when one feeds becomes important.
Hens will feed until their crop is full. After this they may forage for treats but most will eat, fill their crop and rest for a while while they digest.
You can see the following using one of those small measuring jugs.
1.25oz approximatley equals 35grams.
Better still is to crush pellets or use crumble add water to make a mash using 35grams of feed. Mould it into a ball and go and find a hen that has just eaten.
Feel the hens crop and compare it to the ball of feed in your hand. That should be enough but for the sake of making the point quite clear, now make a 120gram ball and see if you think it could be sqeezed into the hens crop.
I've dont this a few times with various breeds and the conclusion I came to was it was not possible for a hen to ingest 120 grams of feed in one sitting.
Blue Spot from tribe 2, a Bantam hen with a good appetite and a regular layer I estimated had a 30gram to 35gram crop capacity. She needed about 70 grams a day at her bodyweight so with a bit of foraging two meals was plenty.
Fudge a Marans and Bantam cross from Tribe 1 had about a 40gram capacity crop. Again 2 meals and a further third foraged was enough.
This is massive guestimating with a bit of measurements thrown in but the point is, one feed a day is not enough to provide the 120grams with all the nutrients the hen needs.
I fed my uncles hens twice a day and they were free rangers.
I fed the tribes in Catalonia twice a day and they were free rangers.
The allotment chickens don't have anything to eat in the space they are contained in apart from each other, feathers, paper bedding and the occasional weed that pokes through the fence. To get even close to full nutitional required intake the allotment chickens need feeding at least twice a day and if I'm not letting then out and providing extras, three times a day with sufficient time to empty their crops in between.
In most keeping circumstances a chickens crop is rarely completely empty and given the opportunity they will top up thoroughout the day. So say they get fed at 2pm and I arrive at 3pm and feed them and they go to roost at 5pm there is no way they are getting the amount of feed they need.
I'm feeling so proud and excited. Seems my whole flock is holding vigil. My baby is not a baby anymore 
