What food for bantams?

[huntsman]

One friend suggested wild bird seed, but the woman who kindly gave me the chicks disagrees, so I am totally confused.

I have a hen and NINE chicks, suddenly, and would love some advice, pls?

 

[Fay at Frizzled Feathers]

feed the hen laying mesh and the chicks chick starter .

 

[Enchanted Sunrise Farms]

If the hen is caring for the chicks, just feed the medicated chick starter to make sure the chicks are protected from coccidiosis. It won't hurt the hen. If they are teeny bantams, you may want to blend the food in a processor. i have silkies and will do this with their food for the first couple of weeks. You don't want to give the chicks wild bird seed. The chick starter will have everything they need nutritionally.

 

[huntsman]

Thank you for your replies so far!

The smallest chick is about the size of a large man's fist, so certainly not tiny...several weeks maybe?

Ok, I'll avoid wild bird seed.

 

[Akane]

Give them poultry feed. There are age appropriate feeds but you don't have to follow that exactly. All of mine eat gamebird feed since I don't want to feed medicated starter, they feather and grow faster on the higher protein, and it means I can feed them all the same thing irregardless of age. I just give the adults oyster shell since any feed appropriate for chicks does not have enough calcium for laying hens. Chicks will get health problems from layer feed or other sources with too much calcium. Hens will only benefit from the higher protein in chick appropriate feeds so long as they have a source of calcium.

Bird seed will not get you very big chickens or very many eggs. If they aren't outdoors on the ground they could die from lack of grit to digest it or just plain starve to death. Anything solid aside from poultry feed requires grit to grind up. Chickens like other birds don't have teeth and use rocks for the same things you would chew. Poultry feed though is designed to not require grit unless it specifies otherwise. Some organic or custom mixes may have whole grains or seeds that would require grit.

 

[Sissy]

Akane... Ditto

 

[huntsman]

My banties are in a run with an earth floor. Shall I add grit in some form?

 

[jenjscott]

They won't need grit unless they are getting something beside the prepared chow.

 

[Hattie the Hen]

Just put some fine grit or ground oyster shell in a container & leave it there -- they will help themselves!

Hattie

 

[cobrien]

I had a baby chick get impacted crop once and posted here for help. I had just given this chick some grit the day before. Someone here told me she was too young for grit and it may have caused the impacted crop. Don't know for sure, I am not an expert, but I do know that they don't need it if just eating chicken food.