raising happy chickens page 2

[Karma]

My chickens really love to eat chicken! Table scraps get devoured like nobody's business. We use organic pellets by Purina Mills under the "Organic Pride" label. Who cares that they eat grains, their bodies are designed to eat just about anything. I watch mine eat dirt clods for crying out loud. The folks at Storeys know what they are doing. Check them out. Amazon.com: Storey's Guide to Raising Chickens: Care / Feeding / Facilities (9781580173254): Gail Damerow: Books

[bodhimama]

I feed ours table scraps - but no beans (not that you have any, you're primal, right? ), onions, garlic - they will make the eggs taste weird for a few days. I know chickens will eat bugs and even rodents but I don't feed mine chicken or cow. No citrus peels either. But veggies, fruit, etc - they love. I do feed them back their crushed eggshells for extra calcium.

I use a high-quality locally produced layer pellet. They lay better and are much healthier when they have a good feed to supplement their pasture. In winter we have snow cover so they just eat chicken feed and scraps for winter. In spring/summer/fall they love to forage for bugs etc, but they also LOVE to eat grass and weeds. Unless you have a large area you can fence for them, they will defoliate anywhere you put them, so we rotate where they are regularly, using movable electric net fencing. We have 25 acres, so this is easy, but you can simulate it with fewer chickens and smaller pastures, or even a small movable chicken tractor, in a yard.

We raise meat birds - planning to do 200 this year (family of 4 eating primal! and my 10yo ds with autism eats primarily chicken and a LOT of it - he is Boy Grok personified, he is very active outside), 100 at a time. And we raise laying hens - have 9 currently, thanks to the efforts of our labrador retriever to retrieve them!!!, but have had anywhere from 9 to 38 at any given time in the past 4 years.

Oh and old laying hens make fantastic chicken stock. It's so rich and delicious!

[K.ROB]

I can't find it anywhere but on the last PaleoSolutionPodcast Chris Kresser was on and talked about a feed place in Washington. He said its the only place he will by feed from because its corn and soy free.

[Funkadelic Flash]

For happy hens, give them a cock.

[lizch]

I got my chicks today! I went to the local feed store expecting just to pick up supplies, and they had the very breed of chick I wanted (black australorp) available. So I now have 5 australorps and 2 rhode island reds cheeping away in my laundry room.

Do they stop cheeping at night? It could possibly get just a tad irritating, particularly to my husband who is not exactly enthused by my foray into food production...

[Acteon]

I've seen chickens living in the wild. They occasionnally climb trees to eat whatever tiny fruits they produce.

If you have a compost heap in your yard, it will provide your chickens with plenty of bugs and worms to eat.

[lizch]

Just wanted to add a link to photos....I'll try not to become obnoxiously talkative about my flock!
https://www.facebook.com/album.php?a...2&l=f7165de479

[primaltreehgr]

i have eleven happy chickens, they are out during the day scratching for food, but it is difficult when there is snow on the ground!! i buy an organic egg layer mix. . . guess i should read what exactly is in the mix. i also give them all of our table scraps since i cannot compost in the winter and the LOVE them. we get bright orange yokes!

[transylvanian.girl]

Ummmm.....If you're planning to let the chickens lose where your garden is, you better fence the garden. They will destroy it!
Or an easier solution: google chicken tractors. YOu can even find instructions on how to build one yourself. Then your chickens can stay in there and you can move that around in your yard so they are still "cage free", but you just limit where they can go.

i wonder if they are going to gobble up the veggie garden i am planning? should i be concerned about that? maybe they will just do the weeding for me.

[transylvanian.girl]

One thing that chickes like and is actually good for them is sea shells. YOu can also use the shells of the eggs, just make sure you brak them in tiny pieces, because if you throw the hole thing for them to pick on, they might learn to crack the shells of the fresh eggs.