Over the past couple of days we have been feeding our chickens a mix of pollard, calcium carbonate, rolled oats, powdered milk and water. The mix is divided into two portions to feed both of the flocks.
Our mix is:
- 175 grams of pollard;
- 75 grams of rolled oats
- 1/2 cup of powdered milk;
- 1/4 teaspoon of calcium carbonate and
- 3 cups of water
The pollard mash is mixed up and then fed to the chickens twice a day. They have shown themselves to be VERY interested in this feed mix and don’t seem to miss their chicken pellets at all. In fact, the chickens are SO excited by their new feed that we are now having to teach Howard not to peck us. He has drawn blood on me once and has pecked my darling wife’s gumboots quite savagely. He is being taught by being booted up the cloaca (well pushed away vigorously, really).
Today our young rooster was sent to a new home out in Forcett and the hens were moved from their run into the larger run. It was sad to say goodbye to our little rooster, but it is a hell of a lot nicer than the alternative … a fight to the death with the dominant rooster.
My darling wife, gorgeous daughter and I had a great time catching the young pullets so that we could take them from their old run to the grown up chicken run. Ferrying the chickens from run to run wasn’t too hard, once the chickens were caught, they settled down very quickly and it was easy to carry them the 200 meters or so. The older chickens were a little bit put out, but Howard thought that it was another Christmas present … just for him. We gave the chickens an extra feed to distract them and that seemed to do the trick.
We will leave the door to the chicken run closed for a couple of days so that the pullets get used to their new coop and settle in to their new position in the pecking order. There is likely to be some disagreements over pecking order, but then, that’s nature.
I will post some pictures of the mega-flock tomorrow.
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