Too much food waste-Chickens!

I have those big galvanized chicken feeders that hang. My Chickens waste so much food; i noticed about a bags worth laying on the chicken house floor. What does everyone do to correct this? I noticed that there are some holes on the sides of the feeder and i think i might choke it down a bit..but not sure if this will work. This food is ridiculously expensive and i don't want them to be wasting it
thanks

Goodness, go and look at this thread. This is what Ken made and boy, I have saved so much on food in the past three weeks I can't believe it. Read all the posts. I have gone over 2 weeks on a bag of feed compared to filling up every 5 or 6 days. The chickens DID spill so much on the floor and would not eat that very much. It is the orpingtons, the other breeds never were like this. Wasters. Look at this thread, and good luck, get Hubby to get on makin' ya one, awesome stuff, have an awesome day, CynthiaM.

https://wcps.canadian-forum.com/t6929-a-feeder-design-with-improvements-yet-to-be-made

If you put a lip on the inside rim of the feeder it will cut down on waste significantly, and inch or two is all that is needed.

I have hanging feeders in all my coops and this is what I do. I hang the feeders so that the lip of the feed pan is as high as the backs of the chickens (shorter chickens can stretch up to eat no problem). When the feeder is raised to this height, the chickens can't beak out the food. I guarantee you will see a huge difference. I have no waste at all. The worst thing you can do with a hanging feeder is set it on the ground. They will waste bags of feed beaking out the crumbles or pellets looking for the golden crumb.

I have hanging feeders and like Lil Farm says not to, mine are on the ground. My birds do not waste feed.

Since bears are a problem, I make sure my feeders are empty everynight. My birds only get as much food as they are going to eat in a day. No more. More invites bears to tear down fencing and generally wreak havoc. When your bird knows that it's only going to get X amount, they eat it. THey do not waste it.

Hey thanks guys and gals...Cynthia, that is a great little device...will also try to hang my feeders higher, until chuck can get building...lots of good advice here..
such a great group of chicken fanciers

Pelleted feeds help cut down on wasted food or hen scratch rather than chick scratch. Chickens like to scratch so some spilled feed gets cleaned up while they go about scratching about.

I find turkeys and guinea fowl the messiest. Like Uno I only give enough for one day (even though I have a good hopper) and once in a while take away the feeder entirely - amazing how they will clean up, eventually. "no desert until you finish your first course!"

heda gobbler wrote:I find turkeys and guinea fowl the messiest. Like Uno I only give enough for one day (even though I have a good hopper) and once in a while take away the feeder entirely - amazing how they will clean up, eventually. "no desert until you finish your first course!"

Thats what we do, they usually make sure every last scrap is cleaned up

It also helps to feed whole grains. The crumbles..well they crumble and turn to powder and mush on the floor. The grains stay whole and the chickens scratch them out and eat them.

So i guess i should ask, what does everyone feed? I personally don't like the pellets..just doesn't seem like real food to me. i feed my girls organic layer mash...read $$$$....and chick scratch because i like the littl'er pieces...and whole wheat which i have discovered they don't really like that much...and of course fresh vegies, worms, fruit..
wondering what to change my scratch to...
i have choked down the big hopper feeder and hung it higher; seems to have helped a bit...i will take it away for a day now and then..i like that solution..and will get chuck to build something for the inside, or the tray contraption i saw in a pic to go around the outside..

Butterboy wrote:If you put a lip on the inside rim of the feeder it will cut down on waste significantly, and inch or two is all that is needed.

Pictures please.,

I buy whole oats & barley (organic) and mix them together, then I soak them overnight, rinse in the morning and feed to the chickens. I also give them a bit of non GMO layer pellets in the afternoon.

SucellusFarms wrote:I buy whole oats & barley (organic) and mix them together, then I soak them overnight, rinse in the morning and feed to the chickens. I also give them a bit of non GMO layer pellets in the afternoon.

Do you add the digestive enzyme to your barley feed? Poultry are not able to fully digest barley without it.

There have been quite a few studies done about it.


African Journal of Agricultural Research

According to the tables, it is clear that the use of barley in
broiler diets and a replacement of it with corn caused
weight loss in chickens, but addition of enzymes to the
diets prevented the negative effects of barley. Therefore,
a significant difference between the weights of chickens
fed diets containing barley and those fed diets without
barley was observed; but with the addition of barley, less
weight gain was observed in chickens. The same results
with the feed conversion ratio were also observed.
Hence, the use of barley in broiler diets with enzymes is
recommended. Barley is cheaper than corn; so replacing
barley with corn in broiler and chicken food could be
obtained at a lesser price in the poultry industry.

J. P. Jacob1 and
A. J. Pescatore

Older birds are more able to utilize barley than are young chicks. The ME values for viscous cereals, such as barley, obtained with adult birds do not appear to be applicable to young chickens. The use of feed enzymes in barley-based diets reduces intestinal viscosity, improving the feeding value of barley. Enzyme supplementation also reduces the variation noted for the feeding value seen with unsupplemented barley-based diets. Feeding barley cultivars with widely different β-glucan levels gives similar growth performance when supplemented with dietary enzymes. Enzymes also improve the litter quality of poultry raised on barley-based diets.

I also thought this was an interesting article about feeding whole grains. Talks about what else you need to make it a balanced diet.
http://www.mofga.org/Publications/MaineOrganicFarmerGardener/Summer2003/Chickens/tabid/1481/Default.aspx

Ya, Coopslave this discussion was talked indepth in another topic, fairly recently. Good that you brought it up. Trying to gather what was meant in the informations that you gave. Sounds basically, that older chickens can eat barley better than younger chickens -- probably have more digestive enzymes. It indicates to feed digestic enzymes to chickens if feeding barley. I don't think our chicken scratch that we get from our mill here (Surecrop) has barley in the mix). So....getting back to this, how good is barley for feed. Is it worth the effort to figure out what a digestive enzyme is and how to ensure that the birds eat enough of this digestive enzyme to make digestion of barley properly performed. What is digestive enzyme. I need to know. Just cause that is me. What is it? I know in the human, we eat papaya pills if we think that we need a digestive enzyme, particularly for meat digestion. I know I don't use it, but my Husband, some years ago thought it was better if he ate papaya when he consumed meat. He is not great with digestion of some meats, like red meats.

So.....what is the digestive enzyme for chickens. How can it be assured that the chickens eat it to properly digest, if they are fed barley. Sounds like it is an important food digestion enzyme with barley. Now I wonder what on earth is in barley that makes it so indigestible to chickens. I recall posts in that topic on barley digestion and digestion enzymes, that many people don't feed the enzyme and believe that their chickens digest it well.

Does this enzyme occur naturally in free ranged birds from the earth they travel over? I need to know.

Also, on reading the article, below, I have copied the pertinent part, what on earth does the data that enzymes also improve the litter quality of poultry raised on barley-based diets? What the dickens does that mean anyways? I wonder who cares if the litter quality improves. Or maybe they mean that the barley, if not fed digestive enzymes will make a bunch of whole barley grains, and then that will germinate in the soil if it is used to soil amendments. What the dickens!! I NEED to know (ya I drive myself nuts with a need to know, craziness!!). And what the dickens does "the ME values for viscous cereals......" what does ME values mean? Blah, the more I learn the more I need to know....and what the dickens does "viscous cereals" and "intestinal viscosity" mean. Eeks!! Have an awesome day, CynthiaM.

J. P. Jacob1 and
A. J. Pescatore

Older birds are more able to utilize barley than are young chicks. The ME values for viscous cereals, such as barley, obtained with adult birds do not appear to be applicable to young chickens. The use of feed enzymes in barley-based diets reduces intestinal viscosity, improving the feeding value of barley. Enzyme supplementation also reduces the variation noted for the feeding value seen with unsupplemented barley-based diets. Feeding barley cultivars with widely different β-glucan levels gives similar growth performance when supplemented with dietary enzymes. Enzymes also improve the litter quality of poultry raised on barley-based diets.

CynthiaM, I don't think barley in scratch is an issue, it is more when it is used as a main food source. Barley isn't bad for them, they just don't utilise it efficiently without help. When they speak of litter quality, it is about what their poop is like when they eat barley. It can be thick and sticky (how is that for scientific! ) because it is not digested properly, and when the enzyme is used, it becomes more 'normal'.

University of Kentucky, College of Agriculture

Beta-glucans cause low digestibility and sticky droppings. The sticky droppings create bad litter, which can cause hock problems and damage the breast of broilers. With layers, the sticky droppings adhere to and mark eggs decreasing their quality and marketability. Barley is considered inferior to either corn or wheat as an ingredient in poultry diets.

There is some very good information here that may answer many of your questions.
http://om.ciheam.org/om/pdf/a20/92605073.pdf
Really worth the read if you are interested in feeding whole grains.


I have started another thread so I stop taking over this one, sorry.......

Gosh, I opened a can of worms! I had no idea barley was such an issue. I figure soaking grains overnight and rinsing them off makes them more digestible. Gets rid of the phytates and enzyme inhibitors. I will have to look into this further...

The only reason I use barley is because barley and wheat are the only whole, organic grains I can get. I didn't want to feed only 1 type.

So happy! We hung our feeders higher and choked down the hopper and we have gone from feeding a bag of food /wk down to one bag maybe every 3 weeks. So thank you all for your great comments and suggestions-they worked

Please define `choked down the hopper`. Thank you.