[tobytoby]

Could anyone advise at what age i should stop feeding growers pellets, my chicks are 14 weeks old and fully free range and put away at night. Thanks

[Sbom]

They will be fine on layers now  mine would be well before 14 weeks unless they were being  fattened.

[Rosemary]

I don't move mine on to layer pellets until they start laying. I thought the clue was in the name 

[Castle Farm]

They are supposed to be IN LAY before you change them over.


I do wish people would refrain from giving advise untill they know what their talking about

[Sbom]

I have bred chickens for years and never had any problems, they go from chick crumbs to a wheat layers mix, all seem happy healthy and lay and breed well, kind of speaks for its self. Only ever feed growers to fatteners. But each to there own.
So why EXACTLY just out of interest do you ONLY feed it when there inlay? Not wanting to provoke you just curious and am not narrow minded enough to think there's only one way of doing everything 


My theory being this- I have gutted immature, as in not yet laying hens many times and there have been the making of the eggs there already. Now surely the 'stuff' in the layers that makes it layers not growers feed is to help with the egg production? Well the makings of the eggs are there well before they actually produce a proper egg so surely they benefit from the layers ration?
But as I said before am happy to be corrected.

[Sbom]

Just off to get my bullet proof vest and hat..... Noone told me when I joined this forum that they were an essential piece of kit  but I'm learning!

[Moleskins]

I've just got a few hens 2 weeks ago so I'm in the dark. I thought I'd read that there was something in the growers feed that meant you couldn't eat the eggs hence they came off that pre laying and had layers and grit.

[HelenVF]

I've been doing it wrong for years . Mine are mainly reared under broodies and in with the rest of the flock. They get chick crumbs, mixed corn, and of course, they eat the layers pellets which are meant for the adults. In fact, the adults break them up for them. Never had a problem.

Helen

[Rosemary]

I just do what it says on the tin 

[Sylvia]

Mine have always gone from chick crumbs to cracked wheat to whole wheat. They started on whole wheat from about twelve weeks plus what they got from grassland.

[SouthMains]

Seems like we all do it slightly differently...so here is what I do if it is of any interst. Mine are also raised with the broody, and are isolated for the first 3 or 4 weeks with chick crumb fro both chicks and mum gets growers.  Then they get to mix with all the big girls but I provide a large dog crate which has growers in it, mum gets penned in there for about 1hour on the first day to show the chick where to go, then from then on chicks pop in and out whenever the want, the cage is in the same place as the other hens getting the layers, but the chicks tend to prefer to use the cage as there is less pushing and shoving.  The decision of when the move from grower to layers is made easy, when they can no longer fit through the cage bars they are on to layers.  This seems to be about a 4 weeks short of POL.  Seems to work for me. 

there is an intersting article on the smallholder feed site
http://www.smallholder.co.uk/news/812921.feeds_the_differences_explained/

[Bionic]

 

there is an intersting article on the smallholder feed site
http://www.smallholder.co.uk/news/812921.feeds_the_differences_explained/

The only problem with this article is that it is written by those that have a vested interest in the products.
I have 4 chicks that are a week old and as these are my first chicks I am reading everything I can to make sure they get a good start. They have been on hard boild egg and chick crumbs but I have also given mum some bread, cranberries, meal worms, rice.  She checks everything over and give some to her young also. So even at a week old they have had a variety but mainly egg and chick crumbs. They have had 2 hard boiled eggs a day and I am now going to start phasing that out.
Sally

[tobytoby]

It good to get debate going - hence why i asked the obvious question in the first place?? I will finish this bag of growers pellets and they can go onto layers - as i said they are fully free range and getting plenty and if anything the pellets are only supplementing what they scavenge and ensuring they go to sleep happy and on full tums - just like me

[hughesy]

Way too much chickenology going on here. What did chickens eat before pelleted food was invented?
I used to work at a feed store and over the years I've fed layers, growers, breeders, organic, ex batt food you name it, to all ages of chickens, depending on what I could get cheap due to it being out of date etc. My flock lay well, look good and breed very well. In  fact nothing bad has happened as a result of what feed they've had.

[Beewyched]

It good to get debate going - hence why i asked the obvious question in the first place?? I will finish this bag of growers pellets and they can go onto layers - as i said they are fully free range and getting plenty and if anything the pellets are only supplementing what they scavenge and ensuring they go to sleep happy and on full tums - just like me

  great debate Grant