This week I would like to hear about your more natural practices when it comes to feeding, treating, and generally taking care of your flocks.
- Do you feed organic feed (and where do you purchase it)?
- What do you use to help prevent and treat parasites naturally?
I don’t feed organic; I go for minimally processed instead. First and last thing in the day I offer fermented whole food (mostly wheat, some peas, maize, sunflower seeds, occasionally rolled oats, tinned sardines, cod liver oil, various dairy products) and they eat whatever they want and find when foraging in the diverse garden habitats here from dawn to dusk, e.g. at this time of year: grass, weeds and their seeds (e.g. dock and plantain), sorrel, mushrooms, insects, and occasional reptiles, amphibians or small mammals (especially shrews). I add local wildflower plants (weeds) as I can, and try to grow any herbs not yet established here, to improve the chickens’ forage opportunities. I do not use any chemicals in the garden.
I buy the wheat +10% maize blend and dried peas by the sack at a local pet store, and mix them daily into the liquor (started with water + natural plain yogurt, maintained as a weak solution and periodically started over) in the proportions I want, which is 10-20% peas, and about 5% sunflower, the rest wheat + maize, to ferment overnight. The oats, sardines, cod liver oil and dairy products are all bought in the supermarket (as they are human grade food).
This year I made my own chick feed, following suggestions in poultry handbooks that were written before commercial feeds were invented or widely available. Obviously that was not medicated. 11 out of 12 chicks (in 3 different clutches) are alive and well and maturing as I write.
I have changed how I treat parasites as I have got more experienced.
I have only ever wormed the flock once, via medicated pellets, when I was starting out. If exposed to modest doses, as they are if ranging on pasture from hatch, chickens develop resistance to them (so too for coccidia, see e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coccidia), or they don’t make it to adulthood.
I use robust recycled plastic coops to create an unfavourable environment for mites, and they have never been a problem; they do arrive periodically, but if spotted, they are easy to eradicate from these coops (see e.g. https://www.backyardchickens.com/th...hickens-thread.1502267/page-907#post-26093710 post 9063).
I have found that only birds that are already sick with something else are really troubled by parasites. I have used ivermectin pour-on drops (sold for use on pigeons here) when a bird seems infested with lice, but in most cases, it turned out to be only a temporary alleviation of their suffering, and they were infested only because they were too ill to dustbathe or preen. On the other hand, it has probably saved the life of at least one of my birds, so I now try it for one cycle if a bird seems to have a problem with lice but is otherwise strong.
The chickens make dustbaths where they will in lawn, beds and borders. They also have a large, covered area of dry earth for the purpose, and a lidded tote box in another part of the garden. I mix sand, bonfire ashes and diatomaceous earth in the tote box, which is open when the weather is dry.
Since there are far more beneficial bacteria than harmful ones living in and on a chicken’s body, I do not use antibiotics. I want of flock of robust resilient chickens, who, while not registered as organic, live as naturally as I can make it for them.
Edited to add: I forgot mealworms. I also keep a mealworm farm to supply live mealworms to the chickens. The mealworms eat bran and veg trimmings, and they are then fed to the chickens as a good source of protein on an ad hoc basis.
Last edited: