I Made My Own Chicken Feed, Here's What Happened

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Last week I watched a video by Poplar Preparedness that said Tractor Supply changed the chicken feed formula for Producers Pride and Dumor due to supply shortages and many many people whose chickens were eating this feed stopped laying. My sister was using Producers Pride and her girls stopped laying until she switched to another brand.

I also recommend fermenting chicken feed which isn't crumbles or pellets. It makes the food more digestible, naturally adds probiotics and increases vitamin levels, and doubles the mass of the feed (which also saves money). We're going soy-free, too. No more cheap TSC feed here, as like hundreds of other chicken owners we experienced a steep drop in egg production in the summer of 2022 - not sure why this happened but people all over the country reported the same thing. Changed the feed and BOOM the eggs are rollin'!

The secret in the chicken feed industry is that it takes a MINIMUM of 16% protein for them to lay eggs. If you boost that higher you get better results. Soak black oil sunflower seeds in water overnight then drain it and allow the seeds to sprout green in the bucket (3-4 days). You’ll get much much higher protein and they’ll absolutely hammer it. Still need to give them free choice calcium/oyster shell.

My chickens molt in early fall and stop laying at that time. I read that growing feathers requires a lot of protein, but from my observation it also requires a lot of effort on their part to groom and remove old feathers. They stay inside almost the entire time that they molt. I just decided to let them go through their cycles and rest.

I had the same problem. Added red pepper flakes and by day five my egg production was back up.

I have raised chickens for years. I generally find that after the winter solstice, December 21, the laying picks up. I encourage you to not force the laying too much as the girls need a break in order to stay healthy. Just my two cents. Lol

Personally I think feed makes a difference with egg laying. I have chickens that were hatched same time as my mom’s chickens. Only difference is she feeds nothing but store bought feed and hers are in a stationary coop. Were as we rotate our chickens through the pasture and feed them a lot of whole corn, table scraps and mixed greens we’ve been getting out of the garden and we’ve not seen egg production slow up at all but on the other hand she has not gotten an egg in a week

Always interested to a 'make your own'. I am researching how the farmer/homesteader fed their chickens way back in the day from 1600 till 1800, as I do, I find it was mostly scraps, left over garden, etc. I have experienced with making rice, corn bread, mashed avacado, sweet potatoes, powder greens and some dehydrated fruit I have done, with the calcium powder I make from the egg shells I have. With winter and the slow of laying, which is almost nothing just now, I am looking forward to warmer and longer days to see how this will work. Thanks for sharing. In Joy

I have 13 hens and I get 6 to 12 eggs daily. (11 yesterday, Feb 12, 2023) I make my feed (w blk oil sunflower seeds, not soy) and give them a few collard green leaves every day. Plus intermittent treats of mealworms, peanuts, salmon & sweet pot cat food. I throw in a sweet pot or winter squash now and then. They come running whenever I come their way and that makes me happy. I believe happy chickens provide eggs. Simple old lady here but I have so many eggs that I have to sell some. 😳 Oh well. 🤣

My hens are still laying & I'm getting 12-13/day. They free range when the weather is nice. We're having a warm January, so we've let them out often. Egg production went down one week, then went back to normal. Right now, we're using corn, wheat, laying pellets & oyster shells. We mixed the shell pieces right in with their feed. If you notice they don't want it, mix it with the feed. I also give them kitchen scraps. If you have any squash or pumpkin, they love the seeds, etc. I also talk toy chickens, & feed them bread as a treat. I think chickens are happier if you talk to them & pet them.

I worked on an egg farm and we gave our hens 17 hours of light a day. It's not so much the food as the light they need.

My grandma added meat scraps to the chicken feed in the winter to maintain egg production. Most in my area, Eastern Oregon, stated that it worked.

I see you have a Producers Pride chicken feed. Just came across a YouTube video that talked about the chicken feed specifically, Dumor and Producers pride from TLC. Apparently chickens have stopped laying for a whole lot of people and they thought it was just the natural molting, time of year. Some of the comments say that when they switched to a local feed store or made their own, they started getting eggs again.

I used to raise and sell hatching eggs a couple of decades ago. I had over 1700 birds of various breeds and color of breeds. My Rhode Island Whites didn't lay hardly at all during warm weather and longer days but during the winter I had to collect several times a day or eggs may freeze before I could get them. :D I retired from that (too much work at 60) A couple of my hens are 8 years old and older in my flock of 30 birds. All different ages. I have a light but it goes off 2 hours after dark. With the rising costs of power I don't burn anything that isn't necessary and let the girls have their natural cycle. I also use energy efficient light (basically so we can see to lock them up) and different breeds that lay more or less in different seasons. I pretty much just love chickens and will always have some. None will/can be culled or sold. I have a 36 yr old high functioning autistic son and he has named just about every one of them. lol They are relaxing therapy. :D During the warm months I scramble and freeze or freeze dry the eggs and what I can't get a handle on. (Way too many eggs) I give to my daughter and oldest son. I am getting enough eggs+ right at 6 to 8 a day for my hubby, son and I. We are in northern middle TN so our winter isn't too long. Not like it was in Michigan!

I have been thinking it's the food for a while but not with any particular type. I started back paying more attention to what I give them or lack of what I wasn't giving them with the feed. I started mixing in the food oyster shells, chick grit, grains and diatomaceous earth. You know all the things you did when you first got chickens and wanted to do everything right. You know the things you did before you got too confident with how well you were doing raising chickens (maybe that was just me lol). I also started putting a little hot water in my feed. It takes less food because 1. They get more nutrients that way 2. They don't waste as much throwing it around. We are getting back to normal around here and it's such a relief!!!! I fully feel that many factors are taking place here. Supply chain causing feed to become contaminated more, companies using cheaper ingredients, and experiments with "suitable indicator assessing feed efficiency, residual feed intake (RFI)". God bless and let's stick together Together with stand divided we fall

So long as you understand they will stop laying earlier in their lifecycle have at it. Can also put some added stress on them forcing year round egg production. There are always pros and cons to every decision.

I've tried a lot of food variations through the years but I never had much change in the egg laying habits with it. So yeah I'd say the light made the difference. They always seem to quit, or at least drastically slow up, in midsummer and during winter. But they also usually start back up in February - which is when most wild birds start nesting.

My husband worked at a industrial eggs farm where they have millions of chickens and the food is very controlled and specific the light is the main factor to keep the chickens laying. In the large chicken houses they have the lights on year round and it is incredibly technical for eggs production. My husband was a industrial electrician and was always busy working on the equipment to sort and clean and carton the eggs. He used to bring home videos clips of how it worked. Back then we could not have chickens because of laws to protect the flocks.

I don’t have chickens, don’t want chickens but nonetheless, I found this interesting. I’ve discovered that regardless of what Wes’s publishes, I’ll watch it. He somehow manages to make the most mundane topics interesting. I guess I’m hooked on this channel.