Alternative Feeds

I have been working with a poultry rancher in Nigeria to develop an economical, nutritious feed for his "all natural" flocks of broilers. Everything I had studied in the past and everything I post here and in the YOUTUBE videos is based on traditional grains in a feed. I have done this because so very many that find my "stuff" are backyard poultry people and not moderate to large growers. Therefore many just want something easy that is nutritious. Lately though, I get a lot of interest about alternatives!

While I cannot find any real  problems with GM feeds in the mainstream, there are still a large number who do not want to use them due to fringe media and reports. Also, there is the monopoly factor with 2-3 multi-national agribusinesses controlling 95% of our feed supply........ so.....

I am going to share my research and new education about potential, alternative feeds with all of you, as well as create a new video about the possibilities. In these, I will cover growing insects, sustainable fodders where you will NOT have to keep buying seed to grow and alternative vegetable protein sources.

What I will NOT cover is fodder systems, because they require ongoing purchases of seed, sprouted seed, as it is more labor intensive than insect farming and more apt to spoil and fermented feed, which while nutritious, I consider a passing fad.

But what will be in my information will help us all and those interested in fodder, sprouting & fermenting can find really good articles about these in many other places. So it will be about a week before I get all this together.... watch for the post!

Another Great E-mail & My Response

I received yet another really good e-mail and provided a response that is of interest to us all. It is time that we, mankind, takes a hard look at the way we feed our livestock and find more sustainable ways to do this, as well as most everything else.

I want to share this with you and invite you all to look into what I say in my response and let's research and learn alternative ways to feed our birds and in turn, ourselves!

E-MAIL QUESTION: 

"I live in Canada, but I want to move back home Pakistan. My plan is to start broiler farming. However, feed is the biggest hurdle to get in my limited budget. I was searching youtube and all of a sudden found your lecture which was so practical. I liked it very much.
I watched few of your videos which were mostly on layers. I could not find any for Broiler. My target is to raise about 3000 broiler as one batch. Can you please let me know how can I make home mix feed for them > I am looking two main advantages of home mix feed. First , it is cheap. Second it is of higher quality as you are buy quality products.
please let me know"

HERE IS MY RESPONSE:

"Thank you for writing and for watching my videos! We raise our poultry for both meat and eggs at the same time. So we raise "dual purpose" chickens. I geared my farm and my videos for others with dual purpose flocks, so this is why I do not concentrate on broilers.

  

I do have firm opinions on raising and feeding broilers though and I will share these with you! First, here is the link to my feed mix recipe: http://eco-ranch.us/POULTRYFEEDMIX.pdf

One thing I have noticed in Asia, India in particular, is that the commercial feeds are expensive when compared to our commercial feeds. Also, many people in SE Asia have been taught that chickens must have commercial chicken feed to survive, or be the scrawny "village chickens" that many women tend. They are amazed at my "homemade" mix and that it works! I think that you, with some work and "entrepeneurism" can move well beyond this and perhaps even grow a "niche" product that will sell for a higher price.

My goal when I have raised just broilers, is to raise them quickly. Everyone feels this way! I used the same feed mix on my Cornish Crosses as I did for the rest of the flock. At 20% protein, it seemed to work great. My broilers grew to over 10 pounds, before starting to die of "flip-over". When the first one died, I processed the rest that day. This did take about 16-20  weeks though and the total feed conversion was close to 4-1. You and most growers want the turnover to be closer to 6-8 weeks and about 5 pounds and 3-1 or less. I achieved 5 pounds at 7-8 weeks and had a tender, dense birds with mild flavor. Incidentally, the 10 pound birds were the same, just BIG!

What I would recommend for a straight grain diet, is my recipe for 3-4 weeks, then increasing the protein to 25% for the rest of their lives. Substitute more corn, oats, or milo (sorghum) for wheat and be CERTAIN to use a vitamin/mineral premix.

Right now, I am looking at and hoping to work with growers in both Asia & Africa on moving away from a straight grain diet as it is costly and I think we can do far better with a little work! The moringa tree grows well in Pakistan and is a very excellent source of vegetable protein. Cultivating this could eliminate a great deal of the grains, as would growing a fodder. The down side to fodder though, is you still must buy the seed. Moringa will provide nutritious and viable seeds, so is self -sustaining.

The real way to provide excellent feed,  increased growth and flavor though, is through farming insects along with the chickens. Meal worms (darkling beetles) and black soldier flies can be grown on waste vegetation and even livestock manure. You can sustain your 3000 birds from a 20'x30' building, or less. Feeding these will further lower feed bills and a surplus of either can be sold for human consumption for extra income.

I am still working on this here, but I strongly feel this is the way we must go, particularly as grains go up in price and weather becomes more unstable.

Please stay in touch and let me know your progress!"

Diminishing Egg Production

I have been conversing with a chicken farmer in New York State for several months. He phoned me today with a problem that we are not entirely sure I handled, but gave the best help I could regarding.

Here is the situation: he has been using my feed mix (http://eco-ranch.us/POULTRYFEEDMIX.pdf) for several months with good results. I had recommended that he substitute an 18% hog feed for the corn and part of the soy in his mix, as hog feed will have a pre-mix already added which would save money. This worked, until one day the mill that grinds his feed had a substitute miller who assumed that the "hog feed" was a mistake and added corn & soy instead.


The farmer's egg production doubled! He went back to the old mix next grind and his production halved! What is the problem?????

I thought that his hens may be getting broody, or broody signals from their bodies and were laying less eggs, then they stopped being broody and changed. But this generally affects only 10-15% of our flock and has little impact on our egg production. Plus, his hens are "patent" hens, a hybrid developed for egg production and that trait is suppressed in patent breeds.

My next thought was wheat. Wheat will slow digestion and a lot of wheat will cause a significant drop in egg production. I looked and several hog feed mixes from mills around the country and about one-in-three does use some wheat....... but his mill did not and wheat is very hard for him to find in New York, so that is out.

I noticed that the sodium level in hog premixes is quite a bit higher that in most poultry premixes. Thinking I was on to something, I checked the one I used in Florida where I learned what little I know about feeds and yes, that mix was NOT higher in sodium.

This farmer also added barley to his mix instead of milo (sorghum), as milo is not available in his area. Barley is very hard and thus very hard to digest.... but he was using it when his production was up.

The only thing we did not explore, was sunlight/artificial light. I did not ask this, as I assumed he should have that handled as a current egg producer. But the length of the day always affects egg production and if he depended on natural light only this could have been the issue. We use artificial light all night long here. We do this not so much to improve egg production, but to discourage predators. However the result is good egg production year-around.

So all I could recommend was this: do not use a hog feed, split the corn and soy and add a poultry pre-mix. Stop using barley and carefully monitor the egg production now that the season is stable and see what happens. I did feel rather inadequate in not knowing exactly what his problem was, but life is a learning experience and this has motivated me to try to learn more, for the benefit of us all!

Protein Content Of Various Grains

Ingredient	Percent protein
Dried fish flakes	76
Dried liver	76
Dried earthworms	76
Duckweed	50
Torula yeast	50
Brewers yeast	39
Soybeans (dry roasted)	37
Flaxseed	37
Alfalfa seed	35
Beef, lean	28
Earthworms	28
Fish	28
Sunflower seeds	26.3
Wheat germ	25
Peas and beans, dried	24.5
Sesame seed	19.3
Soybeans (boiled)	17
Wheat bran and/or middlings	16.6
Oats, whole	14
Rice polish	12.8
Rye	12.5
Wheat	12.5
Barley	12.3
Oats	12
Corn	9
Millet	9
Milo	9
Rice, brown	7.5
Milk	3
Whey	29 - 89

I pulled this chart off of a web site that sells chicken waterers and other products: http://www.avianaquamiser.com/posts/Protein_content_in_chicken_feed_ingredients/

It is a good, handy chart to use as you develop your own feed mix. However, NEVER forget the vitamin/mineral pre-mix!