Topic of the Week - Feeding Chickens in Winter

[ChacoLuvsChiggens]

I buy wild bird seed and throw a couple cottage cheese containers in the grass portion of their run. They love to scratch, and it keeps them occupied.

 

[My Very First 6 Chickens]

While the food mentioned for chickens is all good, it won't do much to keep your chickens warm. Easily digestible fat and calories like suet is a great energy source for chickens during extreme cold.View attachment 4006709
Happy suet eaters.

Hello! Your chickens are SO beautiful! Can you recommend where I can obtain a good SUET source? Thanks!

 

[Apis mellifera]

Hello! Your chickens are SO beautiful! Can you recommend where I can obtain a good SUET source? Thanks!

Local butcher or premade cakes for birdfeeders at stores like TSC. They carry Royal wing Hi Energy cakes. Don't overdo it, I feed them on occasion and during cold spells like we are having now.

 

[Altairsky]

My flock free ranges and follows a natural diet (no industrial feed).
In winter I give them more protein food (meat, milk/curd, fish) because there aren't much bugs around. I also don't worry about raising the amount of fats.

 

[ZombieGirl]

The only real difference in feeding our silkies during the winter months is I make them warm things to eat, like oatmeal, as a treat about once a week. I also make them a mash treat with warm water in a bowl of their crumbles. They think that's a treat too.

For either of the above, things can be added for more nutrition. I turn to our our @BYC Project Manager's article on the Top 50 Herbs for Your Chickens and pick out a couple of things to add. At a minimum, a little cinnamon is almost always surely to be found in anything I make for them.

In the summer, we grow kale for them, and in the winter, we'll pick up a bunch of it weekly from the grocery store as a treat. They sure love it!

In the winter I also ferment grains in quart jars and make it so there's a jar to share between pens about twice a week. If anyone thought about making ferment but it seems a little confusing, let me know. It's very easy or I wouldn't do it.

Thanks for the link to the Herb file!

 

[West Bend]

I do a little bit of all of the above. Not all at once, change it up a bit to keep it fun. Right now it is -12 without the wind chill which brings it down to -29. I work second shift so when I get home at 2:00 in the morning I go out there with a flashlight and some fermented grains/feed and blueberries and feed it to them hoping that will warm their tummies & get them through the night. Another day or two it'll warm up into the twenties.
Even at four degrees when the sun is shining and the winds are light it can be 30 to 40° in the Run during the day.