The waste! Oh the wasted feed...

[larissap112]

lynhill, I don't think zuluchicken flips it. They simply cut the bottom off so they can use it like a funnel, and scoop the feed into the chute.

 

[Lynn Manes]

lynhill, I don't think zuluchicken flips it. They simply cut the bottom off so they can use it like a funnel, and scoop the feed into the chute.

That makes sense. Thanks

 

[zuluchicken]

Hi Lynnhill. You got it. See my first point again. The bottle is permanently mounted upside down onto the pipe like a funnel. I have cut the bottom out. If you would like to go this route try and get as big a bottle possible with tapered shoulders towards to opening of the bottle. This helps the food to all run out down the pipe and not some left behind inside the bottle.

 

[Leahs Mom]

This is my home made automated feeder. I have almost no waste regardless of which food I am using.

This is what I have used.

1. 5Lt water bottle mounted upside down with the bottom cut out.
2. 60mm PVC drain pipe. It fits perfectly over the mouth of the bottle and mounted to the stand. I used different thickness of timber as spacers in order to line the bottle and the drain pipe up and to create space for the receiver.
3. For the receiver I used a piece of 40cm PVC rain gutter that I had mounted on a flat piece of timber as a base. The ends of the gutter were closed of gutter stop ends.
4. The flow of the food is adjusted by inserting different thickness spacers underneath the receiver in order to adjust the gap between the mouth of the drain pipe and the bottom of the gutter. The gap must be small enough to prevent the food from freely running into the gutter. The chickens must eat (peck) it out from underneath the pipe which results in almost no spillage. It works well for all types of dry food. It also keeps the chickens occupied.
5. The 5Lt water bottle holds enough food for 11 fully grown Buff Orpingtons for 2 days. I would like to fit a larger container at the top so that I can increase the feeding period to one week.

Hope this helps. It is easy and cheap to make and it works very effectively. Try and make the container at the top as big as possible right from the beginning.

This has the same advantages as my bread pans with the trough being deep enough that they can't spill it out with their beaks. I've thought about doing some kind of feed shute like that for when I feed dry.

Nice thing about the bread pans is that if you're not "handy", or don't want to "build" anything, they're ready-to-go with no building required.

 

[Sandiejo13]

We have been feeding ours mash for the past 2 yrs... we don't let it get to the "ferment" stage...as they don't really care for it at that stage....and it never lasts long enough in the pan to ferment.....we just mix it daily till the consistency of thick oatmeal....it takes only a few min.... and never any mess or waste and uses all the "powder" in the bottom of the bag ... the crumble works best for this.... we also use "Little Giant" small, 4 Qt, heavy rubber feeding pans.... the only time these tip over is when they are empty, or almost empty, but the mash stays put,still no loss of food on the ground that they won't clean up....

for 125 chickens, that free range, we use about 6 scoops of layer feed a day (3 qt feed scoop) in water (about 14 qts).... comes out to about 1 1/2 , 4 gal buckets of mash.... lasts all day, between extra cracked corn, treats, grass, seeds and bugs.... 100 lbs of feed lasts over a week....with no waste.... and we have healthy and happy chickens!

 

[Lynn Manes]

Hi Lynnhill. You got it. See my first point again. The bottle is permanently mounted upside down onto the pipe like a funnel. I have cut the bottom out. If you would like to go this route try and get as big a bottle possible with tapered shoulders towards to opening of the bottle. This helps the food to all run out down the pipe and not some left behind inside the bottle. 

I'm going to show it to Michael to see if he'd like to do this instead. OMW, one more project around here for him. Our list is very long. I wonder if this method would work for ducks. That where we get the most waste. Our quails were wasting alot of feed too but I bought one of those long holders with lots of holes. Think they are designed for chicks. It works much better. We would like to eventually have a setup so we could be comfortable taking off for several days and not having to worry about the birds. Not sure that's ever going to be the case though as I worry about them like they're my kids as it is Oh,and sorry I addressed my questions to the wrong person. I still can't get the hang of the forums yet.

 

[Lynn Manes]

This is my home made automated feeder. I have almost no waste regardless of which food I am using. This is what I have used. 1. 5Lt water bottle mounted upside down with the bottom cut out. 2. 60mm PVC drain pipe. It fits perfectly over the mouth of the bottle and mounted to the stand. I used different thickness of timber as spacers in order to line the bottle and the drain pipe up and to create space for the receiver. 3. For the receiver I used a piece of 40cm PVC rain gutter that I had mounted on a flat piece of timber as a base. The ends of the gutter were closed of gutter stop ends. 4. The flow of the food is adjusted by inserting different thickness spacers underneath the receiver in order to adjust the gap between the mouth of the drain pipe and the bottom of the gutter. The gap must be small enough to prevent the food from freely running into the gutter. The chickens must eat (peck) it out from underneath the pipe which results in almost no spillage. It works well for all types of dry food. It also keeps the chickens occupied. 5. The 5Lt water bottle holds enough food for 11 fully grown Buff Orpingtons for 2 days. I would like to fit a larger container at the top so that I can increase the feeding period to one week. Hope this helps. It is easy and cheap to make and it works very effectively. Try and make the container at the top as big as possible right from the beginning.

zuluchicken, thanks for the ovation

 

[StevenW]

I used to fill a large feeder and hang it in the coop, they would waste 1/2 of it. Now I daily give them about what they can eat in a day, and the mess is greatly reduced. They act like dogs....if there is a lot of food, they eat what they want, then toss it all over the place otherwise..

 

[wldrabbit]

I don't hang mine and just leave it on the ground. If you can't adjust it then don't fill it so much and don't refill it until they eat most of what's on the ground. I still feed my chickens and two guineas crumble. They free range now so they eat off of a full feeder like that for a couple of weeks and I have 4 grown chickens and 2 guineas. I really just use it as a supplement along with some scratch feed. "Momma Hen" a Wyandotte, my only layer drops a brown egg daily on schedule and the yolks are deep yellow and the shell is brown and thick. I'm not sure the purpose of the pellet but they seem too big to me even for an adult bird even though mine can devour a sweet feed pellet my horses drop from their mouths. It's the same stuff and the bag says it's good for adult layers.

 

[rhackenb]

I have used a 2 gallon dry dog food feeder from Walmart with success. You fill the plastic jar with feed from the lid in the bottom of the inverted jar that is screwed into the base. The feeder. It isn't the one shown but it is similar. There is very little waste. I thought I only paid under $10.

This works fine if you want to have feed available all the time. However, after they are chicks, I only feed the chickens (35 of them) once a day in the early afternoon. I want them to eat grass and bugs in the pasture/run. When I do bring feed in bowls, they mob me and really fight to get their share. I spread out the feed in four plastic bowls but deliberately spill some on the ground so that more get a chance at it. It's like a shark feeding frenzy. They also get a hefty supplement of scraps from defective vegetables in our garden. They really like tomatoes. People might consider overplanting vegetables and feeding the excess to the chickens. The yolks are a dark orange and the eggs actually have taste. Chickens also like meat scraps (including chicken!) from the table.

http://datasink.com/images/farm/chickens1.jpg