Natural Chicken Farming?

[Anonymous]

I was wondering if anyone could attest to the techniques of natural farming in raising chickens. Like, for example, instead of vaccinating your chickens and giving them antibiotics, you add fermented herbal concoctions to their drinking water to strengthen their resistance, deworm them etc..

I was wondering though, can these methods really replace the whole "medicate your chickens all the time" paradigm, or is this just wishful thinking? Has anyone had experience with this and not medicating their flock? ty

 

[Chuck]

We don't all medicate our chickens all the time ! I use medication when really necesaary & no vaccinations.
I am not believer in 'alternative' treatments so not able to comment further.

 

[Anonymous]

Okay Chuck. am just wondering if vaccination and medicated feed is something that I will need to get into, as I'll be doing some intensive free range raising..

How about the others? do you guys use medicated feeds and vaccines for your flock?

 

[chrismahon]

No vaccines at all with our Pedigrees. Having said that they all caught IB and ILT from two hybrids we introduced that had been given live viruses. This now standard commercial practice -goes in drinking water so they all catch it at the same time. It is a mild version of a group of viruses. Problem is that as it is transmitted it gets far worse. Sometimes you will see young hybrids with a runny nose and eyes. They smell bad and this is ILT and the bird has reacted badly and should be avoided. One of our birds is two and still hasn't shaken it off -lays OK though.
Plenty of grass as that seems to drag the worms out. 50 hens eat as much grass as our ewe. Forget the official 10 square metres per free ranging bird. They will turn that small area into mud in Winter. You need at least 20 square metres. Good balanced diet with fruit and fresh veg thrown in periodically. Ours get apples in Winter which we store. They are easy to find as many people with fruit trees don't bother picking them. We grow as store sweet corn for them in winter as well.
Flubenvet wormer I would say is essential every 6 months when free ranging. Keep an eye out for lice and mites as wild birds carry them.
Friend of ours is a qualified medical herbalist. She gets her stuff 'trade' but it is still far too expensive. It also takes weeks to have any effect rather than days. Her birds are no healthier than ours.
If you are free ranging intensively I suppose you are looking for a profit. In that case you will have to be commercial minded. Sick birds are despatched immediately as treatment eliminates your profit. Hybrids only, kept for 12 months before being replaced as they slow down laying after that (or stop).
We do not operate in a commercial manner. Our birds get vet treatment as required and are allowed to live out their life in full. We use food without the chemical colourants, which costs us more. I have calculated that, excluding labour or capital costs, 6 eggs costs us £1.90 to produce. We sell them for £1.30 so we loose about £300 a year. With capital costs we loose £1000 a year. For our labour we get 3 free eggs a day. Still love keeping chickens.

 

[tygrysek75]

Natural farming is still possible but you have to select heathy strong birds and be very ruthles in this.Also the better the feed and if generally birds are well loked after(cleaning regulary and prowiding them with plenty of space.I'm using EM(effective microorganizms) for my birds for they drinking water and adding probiotyk bookashi for they feed.I also using EM to clean the cop.My cop was treated with creosote,so I have no red mites or any other bugs.I check my birds every day for any parasites any anything out of order.I'm also waigh them regulary as any change can indicate problem.They have sand for they dust bath mixed with ashes and diatom.I have my birds not very long and so far no problems.Read about EM as you may find solution for you.This is a great stuf and recently I had seen feed for chickens preemixed with bookashi.

 

[Jaqs]

I think you need to go very carefull with natural farming I managed for 2 years without any medication or medicated chick food then last year lost all my young chicks to coccidesous (sorry about spelling) had poor egg production I was getting afraid to go down the garden in the morning in case anymore were ill or dead I had brought illness back to my flock from a dealer in chickens who I got my feed from. Thanks to a good vet and new housing I am rebuilding back my breeding stock and no sign of illness this year (fingers crossed) but it cost me much more than money

 

[Frenchchickens123]

Hi, I am now doing it. My birds are all fed grain no pellets, chicks are the same. I have myco in my flock and the first couple of times my chooks got it I gave antibs now I don't give them anything as I would prefer them to build natural immunity. None of my birds are vaccinated. I only use apple cider vinigar to worm my birds and they free range, oyster shell for layers and kelp for vitamins and minerals plus kitchen scraps. My chicks are all in the same pen as the rest of the flock. All depends on what you want from your chickens. My layers lay extremly well all lay 6 days out of 7 and are very happy. My meat birds can be a bit slow for putting their weight on especially at the early stages I think they would do far better if started in chick crumbs and will help overall healthwise and immunity. I am also thinking of feeding them when their older with a bit of commercial food to help with weight gain. This is simply because by the time they are ready for the table the meat isn't quite as tender as I would like. If a time came when my chickens were ill and the mortality rate would be high I would medicate as I have put a lot of time money and effort into my flock it would be waste if they died because I refused to treat them. Hope this helps you in your quest for natural farming but I think to have a true natural farming may be a costly thing!