A friend said, “Chris, my wife wants to know what you feed those birds.  She doesn’t want to eat any eggs other than yours.”

That’s always nice to hear.

We grind the Fertrell rations on the farm.  In short it’s corn, oats and roasted soybean mixed with aragonite and Fertrell Poultry Nutri-Balancer.   Fertrell Poultry Nutri-balancer is mostly soft-rock phosphate and includes kelp, vitamins and probiotics.  Our layers get the layer ration free-choice along with whole kernel corn and oats.  They also get oyster shell free choice (makes the egg shell harder).  Finally, they get a new patch of pasture every third day so there are always fresh greens and bugs available to them.

This all changes in the winter.  We winter the birds (and rabbits) in our greenhouse on deep bedding offering them the same feed along with several flakes up to a bale of hay daily.  The deep bedding provides most of their protein requirements, prevents odors, generates warmth and makes great fertilizer for our gardens.  The hay gives them a source of greens and seeds in winter and helps build up the bedding further.

That’s the plan anyway.  Who knows what will really happen.  Might be even better once I get the other greenhouse built.