How much to feed chickens

May 11, 2011 Posts 2 Comments

Chickens in grassMost
homesteaders I know allow their chickens access to unlimited food, but
this method is really only appropriate for situations where you’re
raising broilers and want them to bulk up as quickly as possible. 
With laying hens, you’ll run into several problems when providing
unlimited food.  First of all, many chickens will pick through the
trough to choose bits they like best (generally corn), which means you
waste a lot of food and the chickens don’t get the right
proportion of
protein in their diet. 
Meanwhile, your chickens will overeat,
which means they put on body fat and lay larger (but fewer) eggs. 
In the end, you’ve got overweight, unhealthy hens and have spent a lot
of money to get there.



The solution is simple
— give your chickens a measured amount of food
each day.  I like to feed the flock first thing in the morning,
scattering the pellets in a wide arc across the ground of their pasture
so that everyone gets a chance to eat.  If you’re doing it right,
the food will be all gone in fifteen minutes or less…except for just
enough lost kernels that the flock stays busy scratching for the rest
of the day.  You’ll also get the side benefit of chickens that
comes running when they see your face.



Chickens eatingThe amount of food your
chickens need for optimum health will vary
based on your individual birds (especially based on their body type),
but one suggestion for layers is 0.25 pounds per chicken per day in the
summer and 0.33 to 0.40 pounds per chicken per day in the winter. 
Assuming you don’t heat their chicken coop, your flock will need the
extra food in the winter so that they can stay warm.  You’ll also
want to reduce the protein content to about 15.5% during the cold
months (easy to accomplish
by throwing in a bit of plain
corn.)



When I started raising
our chickens, I decided to test them out and see
how much food they needed to lay well.  I started by providing
more food
than I thought the flock required, then reduced their rations until I
started to see a decline in egg production.  It just
so happens that my experiment matches up with the recommendations above
— I’m currently feeding my flock exactly 0.25 pounds of food per
chicken per day.  When they’re on new pasture with lots of weeds
coming in from the garden and plenty of scraps coming from the kitchen,
I feel like I might be able to reduce that amount further, but I
haven’t been brave enough to try yet.


Round out your chickens’ diet
with clean water from our chicken waterer.

Black Australorp chicks on pasture

May 9, 2011 Posts No Comments
Chicks on pasture

Chick eatingWhen they reached the ripe
old age of 2.5 weeks, I
decided to take down the cardboard barrier separating the chicks from
the rest of the coop. 
They quickly started exploring the coop, and then slipped through holes
to range out in all directions into the outside world.  At this
age, chicks are small enough to fit through just about any hole, and
they had no trouble popping through the chicken wire fences to wander
from pasture to pasture, but they mostly stayed together and close to
home.



Yellow chickYou might remember that I was
disappointed in the
foraging ability of our Dark Cornish broilers last year, so I was trying
not to get my hopes up too high about this round of chicks.  I
shouldn’t have bothered curbing my enthusiasm.  Our homegrown
chick is pretty good, but the Black Australorps are pros.  A fly
buzzed into their coop and within seconds two chicks were set on a
collision course like baseball outfielders.  (The chicks didn’t
hit each other, but one did catch the fly midair and gulp it
down.)  Once the chicks expanded their range, they were soon
chowing down on worms, insects, and lots of greenery.


Chicks in weeds

I did notice that the
chicks don’t seem to be as discerning as our older chickens. 
Everything looks edible to their little chick eyes, from Japanese
honeysuckle leaves to poison ivy, and I can only guess that they learn
which foods are more tasty over time.  Still, I can’t help
thinking that their meat is going to be tasty
(and nutritious) with all of this wild food from an early age.


Our chicken waterer provides clean water and
keeps our chicks healthy.

How to weigh eggs and calculate weight loss

May 6, 2011 Posts 6 Comments

Weigh egg trayWeighing
your eggs is the best way to make sure you’ve got the
humidity inside
your incubator
right.  I figured some of you might find the idea
daunting, so I’ll take you through it step by step.



First, you want to find
the weight of your eggs at the time you put
them in the incubator.  There’s no need to weigh one egg at a time
— just put all of the eggs on a scales at once.  If you’re lucky
and your tray of eggs can be lifted straight out of the incubator (like
in our new Brinsea
Octagon 20), you can
put the tray and eggs on the
scales together.  Then take the eggs out of the tray and weigh the
tray alone.  The weight of the eggs without the tray can be
calculated using the following simple formula:


(Current
weight of eggs) = (Weight of eggs and tray) – (Weight of tray)



Our eggs and tray
weighed 59.8 ounces at the beginning of our
incubation period and the tray alone weighed 7.3 ounces, so the eggs
weighed:


(Current
weight of eggs) = 59.8 – 7.3

(Current weight of eggs) = 52.5



The next step is to
figure out how much I want the eggs to weigh at the
end of the incubation period.  We’re aiming for a 13% weight loss,
so:


(Goal
weight at end of incubation) = (First day weight of eggs) X 0.87



For our eggs, that is:


(Goal
weight at end of incubation) = 52.5 X 0.87

(Goal weight at end of incubation) = 45.7



It’s also useful to know
what our daily weight loss goal is:


(Daily
goal weight loss) = (First
day weight of eggs) – (Goal weight at end of incubation)
                                                                         
        21



Our eggs need to lose:


(Daily
goal weight loss) = 52.5 –
45.7
                                                     
21

(Daily goal weight loss) = 0.324



(For those of you who
ran away from algebra, be sure to do the subtraction before the
division in the equation above.)



Now I’m ready to find
out if my eggs are on track with their goal
weight loss on a certain day.  After two full days of incubation,
I weighed my eggs and tray again, subtracted out the weight of the
tray, and got a new weight of 51.8 ounces.  Did I have the
humidity set right?



First, I calculate the
goal weight loss for the day:


(Goal
weight loss on a certain day) = (Daily goal weight loss) X (Days since
incubation started)



For my eggs:


(Goal
weight loss on day 2) = 0.324 X 2

(Goal weight loss on day 2) = 0.648



Next, I figure how much
the eggs should weigh now:


(Goal weight on a certain day) = (First day weight of eggs) –
(Goal weight loss on a certain day)



For my eggs:


(Goal
weight on day 2) = 52.5 – 0.648

(Goal weight on day 2) = 51.85



Weighing eggs to check humidityIf
you remember, my eggs weighed 51.8 ounces on day 2, so if anything
they’ve lost just a hair too much weight.  I had let the
incubator’s percent humidity drop down into the high 30s that morning
since it ran in the low 50s the first day, but it looks like I need to
refill the well or close the vent.



I hope this math doesn’t
look daunting!  I promise, it’s simple
arithmetic, and weighing your eggs every two or three days during
incubation should increase your hatch rates.




Our chicken waterer never spills or fills with
POOP.