Countdown to Operation Chicken Rescue

Bought the storage cans… check. Bought the chicken feed, check… Bought the heater for the waterer, check…Coop ready, check…We are nearing the count down to our big chicken rescue adventure!

Today I made the trip to Holland, a 45 minute drive from our home to stock up on chicken feed. I had a number of errands to run as well so I combined the trip as we always do to save time and gas. I shop for feed at Pier’s Feed and Country Store, an animal feed store to get the best price and product. We purchase our dog food, songbird thistle and now chicken feed there as well.

Our new chicken coop in its fenced in run.

My plan is to feed our chickens organic, non GMO, feed only. I was very surprised and pleased to find organic chicken fee (with 16 percent protein) at my feed store. In addition to this bag of mixed grains and proteins, I will supplement with kitchen scraps, bugs/meal worms/crickets, and crab apples from our tree, home-grown sunflowers seeds and green fodder and ground acorns from our White Oak trees which are high in protein and will be saved for the cold winter months.

Selling Kent, horse and livestock feed.

I’m told that this small flock of hens is just being fed cracked corn, so I suspect they will think they are taking a vacation at the chicken B & B!

Our flock will be somewhat confined in their run due to our trained bird-dog so they will depend on me to provide them with healthy and nutritious feed.

Lots of products and choice.

I’ve been doing quite a lot of research on feeding your chickens and this is what I know to be true:

DO NOT Feed Your Chickens This:

• Don’t feed your chickens anything you would not feed your family
• Do not give chicken leftover cooked dry/baked beans
• Raw potato peels
• All soy product contain GMO’s soy so if you wish to be GMO free, skip the soy
• A lot of bread as bread breaks down to sugar and make your birds nervous or aggressive
• Cat food
• If you feed flowers make sure they have not been treated with pesticides.
• Anything too salty, spoiled, or anything moldy

DO Feed Your Chickens This:

• Raw potato peels
• Watch your protein levels and aim for a minimum of 16%-20% protein
• Keep grit available at all times, grit can include; Oyster shells, sand grit, ground egg shells
• Calcium is also important; Oyster shells, organic milk ensure that chickens are getting enough calcium to produce eggs.
• Apple cider vinegar added to the water will help to keep the chickens healthier and free from disease.

If you do need, or want, to make your own organic chicken feed mix here are two recipes you might like to try.

Ingredients for Making Homemade Organic Chicken Feed

Recipe 1

7 to 8 parts organic whole corn 3 parts organic soft white wheat 3 parts organic hard red winter wheat 2 parts organic oat groats 1 to 2 parts organic dried milk 1 to 2 parts fish or organic soybean meal 1/2 part ground oyster shell 1/10 part salt

Recipe 2

3 to 4 parts organic whole corn 2 to 3 parts whole organic wheat 1 part dried organic milk 1 part fish meal 1 part oyster shell 1 part grit 1/2 part salt 1/2 part cod liver oil

Read more: http://www.ehow.com/how_5137841_make-organic-chicken-feed.html

If you would like more sources for on-line organic chicken feed, try any of these options below:

• http://ww38.greenerpasturesfarm.com
• countrysideorganics.com/‎
• doortodoororganics.com/‎
• ebfarm.com/‎

Small House Homesteader and now Chicken Keeper, Donna

The Small House Homestead

As our life changes our blogs change.  Previously I wrote for The Small House Under a Big Sky blog which focused on my restoration of and hand-painting of vintage furniture. Recently I after realizing that our property and garden is a homestead and that we are really rural homesteaders I decided to change the focus of my blog.

For years the word homestead referred to a free government land program and the skills necessary for pioneer living. Today the word homesteading is more apt to refer to a lifestyle that promotes greater self-sufficiency.

By the 1970s, the word homesteading evolved to mean a back to the land movement and creating a lifestyle as tens of thousands of young adults and other adventurous souls threw off the cultural mantle of urban and suburban living and returned to their ancestral rural roots. Over the next three decades, the character of the term homesteading has emerged to include self-sufficient living in urban and suburban settings as well as on rural acreage.

Broadly defined, homesteading is a lifestyle of self-sufficiency. It is characterized by subsistence agriculture, home preservation of foodstuffs, and it may or may not also involve the small-scale production of textiles, clothing, and craftwork for household use or sale. Pursued in different ways around the world — and in different historical eras — homesteading is generally differentiated from rural village or commune living by isolation (either socially or physically) of the homestead.

Modern homesteaders often use renewable energy options including solar electricity and wind power and some even invent DIY cars. Many also choose to plant and grow heirloom vegetables and to raise heritage livestock. Homesteading is not defined by where someone lives, such as the city or the country, but by the lifestyle choices they make.

In our case, we grow and put up organic vegetables, harvest rainwater, build soil, keep chickens for eggs, plant and grow native plantings and create eco-climates for the birds and invertebrates. We feel a sense of commitment to steward our small neck of the woods and to leave this land a better place than it was when we moved here.

 

We are truly part of this group of ‘back-to-the-landers’ who desire to live a greener and more independent and self-reliant lifestyle.

Thank for checking us out!

Donna & Gene Allgaier-Lamberti