That's what I thought too, to begin with, when I had 200 little fluffy butts running around. Then they grew up, and I was feeding them a 50# bag per day. Their feed bill wasn't awesome, just awesomely expensive!50 birds! Wow! That must be awesome! I want more!
They eat stuff off the ground, and bugs from underground. I feed mine leftovers from my plate.
My sister in law claims to know someone who has a huge outdoor flock and feeds their chickens nothing. Bro. can't understand why I "waste" money on food. He doesn't know what it's like when they fly at you screaming when you're late with the feed, and the fights that can occur. I suppose wild chickens subsist on whatever they can find, and I vaguely remember an article in a mag. (Mother Earth ?) about someone who got huge loads of scraps delivered from restaurants and dumped to compost and be eaten by their chickens. I think it said they lived on that, and whatever they foraged.I still don't get it! How can she have 11 year old chickens in such conditions???? I'll go down to give them kale or dandelions and they're just as happy and healthy as can be! Tons of eggs too!
Neither would I nor would I eat mealworms. ICK! I see mealworms more as fish bait if it wasn't being given to the chickens.
Basically they are giving you their GARBAGE. Your chickens should get a nutritionally complete chicken feed every day as scraps do not meet the nutritional requirements. How many chickens do you have that requires 50 lb of feed every month? If you can't afford to feed them properly chicken feed perhaps you should reduce the number of your flock.
There's a video on youtube. It's pretty fun to watch, he's got a system and heavy equipment to turn giant piles.
