Topic of the Week - "Off-grid" Feeding - Homemade feeds, etc.

[Cluckingham palace capers]

I make up a mix of black sunflower seeds ( for brilliant shine on black coats ) steam rolled oats (keeps weight on poor doers) cracked corn (makes yolks extra gold) milo or sorghum (for variety) and soyabean meal ( fantastic protein source and they love it, I have the glossiest coats I’ve seen on any birds ) I chose these grains as I used to show horses and cattle ( with always the best results ) and the chickens were always looking fantastic and only ever died from old age. Now I’m in the suburbs and still getting comments on the brilliant shine even from people who have never showed an interest in chickens. They still free range around the garden during the day so always have access to greens and I also encourage vegetable scraps and fruit daily.

 

[sevenfatcows]

That's an interesting mix and much more practical than most of the DIY mixes I've seen because there are not too many ingredients. Do you use equal proportions?

 

[wyoDreamer]

Easy to grow ingredients also. Do you use the steamed rolled oats for convenience or because they are easier to digest? Is the soybean meal a cooked soybean product or just milled soybeans?

EDIT: I looked it up, most soybean meal is a by-product of oil extraction and is a "cooked" product, which denatures most of the phytoestrogens in the soybeans.

 

[Kusanar]

For what its worth during times of famine normally Herbivores will in fact eat meat.

And some animals that are "Herbivores" now, used to be meat eaters way back in their past, there are videos of Kangaroos eating roadkill and I don't believe that was due to a food shortage so much as the fact that it was food that was laying there.

I went to a class on aquaponics. You can do pretty much any plant except root plants (i.e. potatoes, carrots, etc).

I believe that you could still do carrots, put them in perlite or something similar that doesn't hold a lot of water, and do a flood and drain or drip irrigation in their bed so that it stays damp but not WET (if doing flood and drain have it only flood once or twice in a day) and there is still plenty of room to grow and plenty of air available. Now, you couldn't do that as the ONLY plants, but I do believe that you could do it in a side bed that is running off of it's own pump and still use the fish water to water and fertilize the carrots but not have them be the only nitrogen cleaner in the system.

 

[wvchics]

If you use chicken feed, you are feeding chickens to chickens. Everything that isn't used for chicken meat (feathers, bone, blood, guts, along with polymers used to extract these things from slaughterhouse wastewater) is turned into chicken feed.


As far as prion "diseases" go, the likely culprit is magnesium poisoning. Mark Purdy, an organic dairy farmer, pioneered some compelling research after he noticed that his cows weren't getting Mad Cow Disease, but his neighbors' cows that had Phosmet, an organo-phosphate insecticide that was applied along their spines to kill Warble flies, were.

Oops update: Manganese poisoning, not magnesium. Sorry about that, Chief.

There is no animal byproduct in chicken feed. It's all grain products. Check your feed bags. It is required to list it if any kind of animal byproduct is used. Yes hens will eat bad eggs just like a dog or cat having a litter. This is not the same thing. They will not just eat other chickens naturally. Although a lot of people who feed chicken to their flock complain about these problems.
Regardless of how you justify it you wouldn't be participating in cannibalism yourself given the choice, and I'm pretty sure a lot of you would be offended if you went to dinner then found out you just ate your own offspring.
Cannibalism is unnatural and wrong. Not trying to offend anyone, but I disagree with the concept. The Donner party reverted to cannibalism to survive. So to say it's natural because chickens will do it when starving is to say it is natural for humans too.

 

[BantyChooks]

Although a lot of people who feed chicken to their flock complain about these problems.

Which problems?

 

[HenOnAJuneBug]

There is no animal byproduct in chicken feed. It's all grain products. Check your feed bags. It is required to list it if any kind of animal byproduct is used.

Must be commercial feed then that contains chicken by-products. I just looked at my label and no animal by-products.

 

[HenOnAJuneBug]

I believe that you could still do carrots, put them in perlite or something similar that doesn't hold a lot of water, and do a flood and drain or drip irrigation in their bed so that it stays damp but not WET (if doing flood and drain have it only flood once or twice in a day) and there is still plenty of room to grow and plenty of air available. Now, you couldn't do that as the ONLY plants, but I do believe that you could do it in a side bed that is running off of it's own pump and still use the fish water to water and fertilize the carrots but not have them be the only nitrogen cleaner in the system.

I did carrots, beets, radishes, tarot with flood/drain aquaponics. Tarot went crazy.

 

[Molpet]

interesting article https://nypost.com/2015/04/26/why-nothing-especially-chicken-tastes-like-it-used-to/

 

[BantyChooks]

interesting article https://nypost.com/2015/04/26/why-nothing-especially-chicken-tastes-like-it-used-to/

Interesting, but I had to laugh at this line:
"This chicken was a throwback, a variety nearly vanished since the 1950s"
I don't think I'd call Barred Rocks nearly extinct.