Washingtonians

[itsren]

I might not be part of the OLD

night crew, but I'm here!

Me too! NEWby night crew.

 

[FirewifeJess]

The chart I find went like this

Chick 1/32-1/16
Pullet. 1/16-3/16
Hen. 3/16-5/16

So I give larger rocks for my hens in a feeder in my pen so they can eat all they want.

Me too. I have 2 flower pots in the run next to the feeder, filled with hen grit and oyster shell. They just free-choice it and it's pretty slowly consumed because they also eat rocks in the yard. We're not on layer yet because of the babies in the flock, so the oyster shell goes a tad bit quicker.

 

[Imp]

Imp - yes, they have much larger and more suitable grit for layers. That chick grit is teensy, how cute!

Thank you

 

[Chicken Rustler]

Does anybody use grit for their laying hens or grown roosters. I find a chart that said the different sizes for the different age of your chickens. If you do use it I find a cheaper way than grit from the feed store,go to the fish area of wal-mart, Petsmart or any store that sell fish as pets. I buy the rocks for fish tanks they are the right sizes and way cheaper.

I give everybody grit Free choice. Last time I bought it I paid about $10 for 50lbs. that lasts about 6 months.

 

[FirewifeJess]

I rarely buy scratch anymore. The birdies have been getting small amounts of leftover fruits, veggies and black oil sunflower seeds. I bought a large container of the seeds mid-spring and still have more than half of the container left. I don't remember how much it was, though. They do get the opportunity to range most days and there are PLENTY of buggies and lawn for them to eat. I LOVE when they don't chow thru the bag of feed so quickly!!!

That will be fabulous once the nice weather lets up. DH hates so much poop in the yard when we're trying to use it and let the kids play in it, so for now they spend most of the time in the run. Once the rain comes back they'll be allowed to range full time since the kids and DH won't be using the yard much. That'll be great for my feed bill!

 

[itsren]

Those of you into permaculture you might enjoy this forum.................
http://www.permies.com/forums/

Cool! I'll check it out.

Oh... another good book: http://www.amazon.com/All-New-Square-Foot-Gardening/dp/1591864704

In some of my raised beds I use the square foot gardening technique with EXCEPTION that I do not use Mel Bartholomew's soil mix. I'm not a big fan of of peat mining. That's not to say I haven't used peat in the past, it just means I have to be desperate before I will use it. An example... before we went on our 12-day vacation, which happened to be during the high heat W. WA had, I had sprinkled peat on top of my garden beds and saturated it. That helped save some of my garden beds. Thankfully, it saved $60 worth of Asparagus plants that I planted this year. I didn't sprinkle peat on my corn, and my corn looks lousy.

What I do instead of Mel's soil mix is I double-dig my raised beds down to 12" deep, screen out all the large rocks (I live on a gravel pit - literally - there's a sand and gravel company that mines the earth just a mile and a half from my house), mix in lots of compost and some manure at the beginning of the season. It seems to do my garden well.

 

[Rainwolf]

Formal Garden Planning - 1864
http://archive.org/details/planningyourgard00roge

Hydro-Gardening - ? but newer
http://archive.org/details/TheAmazingHydro-gardenBreakthroughInHome-growing

The gardeners dictionary: containing the methods of cultivating and improving the kitchen, fruit and flower garden, as also the physick garden, wilderness, conservatory, and vineyard (1735)
http://archive.org/details/gardenersdiction01mill

If you can decipher this I'm sure you could come up with some awesome garden ideas!
I have it bookmarked but it is like reading a dictionary (which in a way it is) in old English.
Remember during Shakespeare's age the average everyday person had the working vocabulary of about 2-3 times what we currently use.
And Shakespeare was a playwright who used average everyday language....

*we have more words in the English language today but the majority of it is in scientific language which no one really uses everyday.

 

[Imp]

Quote: I have found it hard to find larger sizes.
Rainy Day- Where are you finding it??

http://www.cherrystonegrit.com/grit_sizes.html

Imp

 

[Hinotori]

Quote:
Cool, thanks! So...do you guys use scratch at all? I have had the same huge bag of it forever now and they go nuts for it but I only give them 2-3 handfuls a day as a treat to keep them from getting bored.

I use scratch in the mix I make up for them. It has a whole bunch of stuff in. The peanuts are their favorite followed by the safflower seeds and milo.

I'm going to go pick up some of the bird seed, I use quite a bit of that in the mix.

 

[itsren]

Our grit is also terribly cheap at Coastal Farm in Auburn. I don't have a clue what it's called either, but way cheaper than any other kind of rocks I've found.

ETA: but I buy everything in bulk, including grit; 50lbs lasts FOREVER, and we started on this bag when they were 4 weeks old. Almost 20 weeks later and we haven't made a dent in it.

I'm pretty sure you and I have the same 50 lb. bag of grit. It is cherry... something. I'll look tomorrow.