Feeding hen & chicks

[SINGER]

Hi all,
This is my first post since registering and I've had a quick look through the FAQ's and can't find one to match my question.
I had a broody sit on 12 eggs and she hatched out 7 chicks, which for a first time effort for a young hen I didn't think was too bad.
They have from the outset been feeding on chick crumb which has an additive to protect against coccidiosis.
The problem is the chicks are now 6 weeks old, are still housed in the same pen as the hen and so all eat the same food, are still eating crumb and the hen today has layed her first egg since going broody.
I've still got about 10kg of chick crumb left and so wanted to use this up before buying different food for them.
Now the way I see it is, if I continue feeding crumb to them all I can't eat the eggs the hen produces because of the additive. The hen would ideally need layers pellets or mash now that she's laying and the chicks would ideally need growers mash to build them up until they start laying, but as they're all housed together this presents a problem.
I'd welcome any advise or suggestions from any of you.
Many thanks
Bob

 

[victorias poultry]

Hi Bob and welcome to the forum, sounds as if mummy hen is about to stop wanting to brood her chicks, normally when they start to lay again they will leave her young. Keep an eye on her as soon as she starts to peck the chicks take her away from them. I would start to mix the crumbs into growers pellets for the next 2 weeks then at 8 weeks of age be onto growers only.

 

[SINGER]

Thanks for the reply.
The hen is showing no sign of aggression towards the chicks, in fact it's more like the other way around - I've seen what I believe to be a cockerel chick rear up to her in a threatening pose and the 2 cockerel chicks have also been squabbling together.
So if I leave them all together and feed as you suggest, once all the crumb has gone will the laying hen be OK eating growers pellets, or would it be better feeding them all layers pellets?
I've only got the one pen so can't really seperate them and feed them differently.
Thanks

 

[Chuck]

You can go from chick to growers or chick to layers. A lot of people, including myself, cut out the growers and go straight onto layers. You can eat the eggs yourself if yuo choose to but you musn't sell them when on medicated feed.

 

[chrismahon]

Hello Singer,
At 6 weeks we have separated our chicks from their mother and they are in a separate pen. You may find that the step from chick crumb to growers is a problem due to the standard size of pellets -some of our chicks stopped eating and began wasting away. Mix in the Smallholder range (smaller pellet size) of growers with the crumb initially. Of course with mother still there and laying you will need to use layers. Presumably the chicks will eventually recover from their feed regime as their growth is noticably stunted when fed chick crumb with ACV and then layers will slow them down too.

 

[SINGER]

Thanks for all the replies,
Here's what I,ve found out since my last post.
I went to my local stockist to buy some food for the chickens and had decided to feed them all layers pellets.
I bought a sack of layers pellets but then noticed it had "ACV" printed all over the plastic sack.
The stockist said it didn't contain ACV, that was just an abreviation of the manufacturers name - Agricultural something....
By good fortune the rep from his suppliers was outside talking to someone else so I collared him to ask him some questions.
I firstly asked if I could eat the eggs being layed by my hen that had been eating chick crumb since the chicks were hatched 7 weeks ago. He didn't know so made a phone call to find out. The official answer that came back was that after withdrawal of ACV from the hens diet you must wait 3 weeks to enable all the chemicals to leave her body before eating the eggs she is laying.
I then asked if it would therefore be OK to feed them all layers pellets which don't contain ACV.
He said no as it is important for the growing birds to get the ingredients from the growers mix to develop into strong healthy birds - layers pellets don't have this.
Next question - So can I feed them all growers pellets?
Answer. Ideally you need to seperate the hen from the young birds and feed them different feeds but if thats not possible or practical you can feed them all growers pellets - but the problem is the growers pellets also contain ACV. The stockist then said that he could get growers pellets without ACV but only to order as it's not something that he normally stocks. I've ordered some of this for saturday collection.
I'm just wandering what everyone else thinks of all this because it's obviously a situation that everyone with a broody & chicks comes across and has to deal with.
3 weeks seems an awfully long time to have to reject the eggs the hen is laying, although I could always whisk them up and add them to the remaining chick crumb that I have and feed this to the young birds only. :?
Would love to hear what you think!!

 

[chrismahon]

Ours love scrambled egg but I wouldn't feed egg raw as it encourages egg eating and doesn't sound too healthy. Runny egg stuck to thier beaks as well. Growers with ACV I have never seen so it must be a commercial product for free range meat chickens -I worry what goes into supermarket chicken. Wise you avoided it I think and unecessary in a back garden situation. One of our local feed suppliers didn't know what ACV on the packet mean't either. You might later think about getting layers without the chemical colourants. All commercial eggs, apart from organic (expensive), have three permitted chemical yolk colourants (which are on the contents label but not always clearly marked). There are speciallist in-between feeds where these chemicals are taken out. They cost about 50% more and Marriages, Dobson and Horrell and the Smallholder Range are ones I've seen so far. Then there are organic feeds but they are too expensive for us. But it's nice to know that your own eggs are fundamentally different to those in the supermarket. You will be amazed by the reaction you get when people exclaim "I didn't know that!" Well they are not going to advertise chemical yolk colourants on the egg box are they!