What do you grow to feed the chickens??

[Arielle]

we plant rye grass for our chickens and they love it. they eat it well enough that we never have to mow

Good to know--- I have been trying to figure out which grass seed to plant this year as we open up some woodland for more grasses. Yeah!!

 

[Weasleymum]

I planted fig, apple and pear trees in my chooks runs 20 years ago.
They get a lot of free food from the fruit now.

Excellent, let me just dust off my time machine, and go back and do that! LOL

 

[Arielle]

Quote: THere is a chinese proverb about 10 years ago being the best time to plant a tree, however the next best time is NOW.

 

[Weasleymum]

THere is a chinese proverb about 10 years ago being the best time to plant a tree, however the next best time is NOW.

Love it. While that might help us, and the next owners of this house, it won't affect these chickens...

 

[Arielle]

Quote: Plant fruit trees for future use; and berry bushes for use sooner. I've been reading where people plant beets and other root crops. THe roots aerate the soil and the chickens eat the greens, which keep growing back. ANd plant winter squash for the chickens for the fall. My birds just ate the last pumpkin that was sitting on a stair going to the second floor. Lasted until mid March in storage, lasted 2 days in the compost attacked by chooks.

 

[Kikiriki]

I know almost nothing about fermentation, but I remeber seeing a documentary on how they did it in some real poor place just using bags. I have seen a lot of people post about it on here, but I would be afraid of wasting all that time on a bad batch... One other thing I recall is that once you open a bag you either have to use it all or ensure all air is out of the container. Don't remeber why...

 Air causes cracked or milled seeds to oxdize; and if it has oils, the oils go rancid.  All cracked or milled feed should be used within a short time of that process to get the most from the feed. 

Storage of whole grains lasts MUCH longer. 

I looked at an experiment done by a BYCer using fermented v not fermented. It was a good experiment with a few flaws-- the next step would be to repeat the experiment with larger numbers of chickens.  The inital experiment showed that ferment feeds resulted in healthier birds with better growth. 

I think this could be duplicated by adding braggs acv to the water IMO, or adding FastTrack( or other brand) of inteastinal good microbes to the birds via treats.

I have found this true for my own body--I use not yogurt as it has too few, but rather a capsule of 5 billion units. This has kept my GI in far better health.  SO I would expect the same for these birds. 

Especially birds kept in artificial environments and cannot get to a natural source found by pecking and scratching outside and eating greens and dirt. 

I just do the yogurt and it has helped me so much: our dogs and chickens get yogurt, as well. The chickens like it spread on bread, but were put off by it being mixed with their regular feed. Creatures of habit, I suppose...

Great info on the fermented feed experiment: thanks for sharing! There are so many threads on BYC it is easy to miss some good ones

 

[Arielle]

Quote: I just do the yogurt and it has helped me so much: our dogs and chickens get yogurt, as well. The chickens like it spread on bread, but were put off by it being mixed with their regular feed. Creatures of habit, I suppose...

Great info on the fermented feed experiment: thanks for sharing! There are so many threads on BYC it is easy to miss some good ones

I think it is under the meat birds-- the details are super to read. The experiment was beautifully done. Very clever. See if I can find it.

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/672135/meatie-experiment-ff-vs-crumbles

 

[Percheron chick]

Mine love spaghetti squash. The great part is you have fresh vegetables all winter long with it. I'll cut up a 3# squash for 20 chickens and they'll have the meat picked clean by bedtime.

 

[Arielle]

Chicken feeding and their entertained all in one.

 

[Marlene2012]

Does anyone grow Barley fooder to feed their poultry?