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To save money? Absolutely not. I'm keeping a spreadsheet on our 20 chickens this year. They're young, so input is very high while output is still ramping but I'
by Jgrubb 2y ago
To save money? Absolutely not. I'm keeping a spreadsheet on our 20 chickens this year. They're young, so input is very high while output is still ramping but I'm guessing it's $7-8 dozen in food costs alone (the highest end organic feed tho), never mind the initial buyin.
- h0l0cube 2y ago> the highest end organic feed tho Maybe feed them your food scraps? Or bulk buy and prepare your own grains/pulses?
- Jgrubb 2y agoIt's a recent experiment, we were on the more reasonably priced organic feed until I discovered my local feed store had this stuff over the holidays, so we're trying it out. The quality of the eggs is absolutely miles above what I already considered really good eggs though. I'll probably get around to making our own someday, but I'm not there just yet.
- h0l0cube 2y agoI've seen someone just chuck a load of split peas in a plastic barrel and submerge with rain water. It naturally ferments with occasional agitation and this is supposed to be good for the chickens. So not so hard to do when you get to that point of wanting to try it.
- swarnie 2y ago> The quality of the eggs is absolutely miles above what I already considered really good eggs though. I must drive past a dozen (lol) honesty boxes on the way to work offering the sale of eggs and this is my general experience as well. Its amazing how individuals can produce and sell a product as cheap if not cheaper than mega corps with such staggeringly different quality.
- DonHopkins 2y agoWe have fresh egg vending machines along the road by farms in the Netherlands! https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinteresting/comments/ne3ivw/im_from_the_netherlands_we_have_vending_machines/ https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinteresting/comments/ne3ivw/i... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9Ui4zmqyxY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9Ui4zmqyxY https://www.fietsnetwerk.nl/en/places/farmers-vending-machine-putten/ https://www.fietsnetwerk.nl/en/places/farmers-vending-machin... https://www.deboeropautomaat.nl https://www.deboeropautomaat.nl Here's a German company that will sell you your own egg vending machine: https://vendy1.de/en/blog/egg-vending-machines/?srsltid=AfmBOoofCuxqOqQuyaYdK8361RWV_8UsrkL4bVQp_7hSOQU4_XXp4BuC https://vendy1.de/en/blog/egg-vending-machines/?srsltid=AfmB... I'm sure drive-through egg vending machines would be popular in the US! (And drive-by egg delivery too.)
- krageon 2y agoThese vending machines exist where few people are
- Cthulhu_ 2y agoI mean if you add everything up - land value, labour, food costs, etc - I'm fairly sure they're selling eggs at a net loss, however, it's not a capitalist endeavour unlike the industrial production. And IMO that is the key difference, that is, they produce for themselves and sell the excess and earn some money off of it, it's not their primary goal to do so.
- conductr 2y agoExactly, even with it being excess, I think the motivation is to reduce waste versus produce money in these situations. They have uses for the waste, it can be eaten by an animal, but that’s also true if it doesn’t get sold
- MagicMoonlight 2y agoThis makes me wonder - would chickens grow more efficiently if you cook their food for them? When we invented cooking it gave us a massive advantage because of the nutritional efficiency, yet we feed animals just random raw stuff. Would feeding them porridge instead of grain lead to higher output?
- pif 2y agoYour proposal may give interesting results in a couple hundred generations of chickens, when evolution has had some time to take profit of the cooked food. But, concerning the hens that lay the eggs I'm supposed to eat, please refrain from experimenting with them, thanks!
- undersuit 2y agoMy chickens feed is a grain mix that can be boiled or even fermented, often called silage with the larger livestock. The chickens love some warm mash on a cold day like today, they'll get some yogurt too.
- philipwhiuk 2y ago> When we invented cooking it gave us a massive advantage because of the nutritional efficiency, I was reasonably confident cooking reduced nutrition but reduced food-based disease way more.
- Sargos 2y agoWhat makes you reasonably confident? Cooking leading to better nutrient absorption and our IQ growth is mainstream science so making a wild contradiction like that without something to back it up isn't very helpful. Helping with food-based illness is an interesting thought though.
- sepositus 2y agoWe have 10 (backyard) chickens and spend about $40/mo in feed. We average about five eggs per day when they are laying, so let's say that's 150 eggs per month. That's $0.26/egg or $3.20 a dozen. But we have to factor in around 4 months of them not laying during the winter. So for laying months, that brings the feed price to around $60/mo or $4.80 a dozen. So yeah, at current prices, it's worth it for us. I also haven't factored in the value of their compost, which is really quite expensive when you're buying as much as they generate, so it's probably even cheaper than listed.
- trod1234 2y agoOut of curiosity why not grow your own feed? In many cases you can cycle the compost back in to the feed you grow (as fertilizer). Around here our eggs are averaging about $9 per 12 on the shelves, and you can't buy just 12, the only eggs on the shelf are the 18/24 packs so about $20-22 per pack, almost the same price as choice meat.
- sepositus 2y agoIt's two 40lb bags. We don't have enough square feet to grow that much feed per month (and still have room for the other stuff we grow).
- trod1234 2y agoI don't know how accurate this is, but there was a youtube video from some homesteader I accidentally ran across saying you can ferment the feed to a mash, and the chickens will eat/need less.
- abe_m 2y agoThe labour and land step up from tending chickens to growing grain is a very large step. If you are organized enough to grow grain, and you're near a farming area, you'd be farther ahead to try to buy right off the field grain at harvest time for cash. Mechanized grain harvesting is an immense labour saver that is unavailable to people growing feed for backyard chickens.
- nkh 2y agoWhat is the amount of time required for all the different chicken activities? (estimated weekly average)
- wakawaka28 2y agoOnce you have it set up, I'd say no more than about 2 hours per week. The feeding and watering can be automated, so it's really just whatever cleaning or optional shuffling of their locations you do. Checking for eggs can be done in a few minutes, and you technically don't have to do it every single day. You might actually choose to spend more than the minimum to tame them and treat them as pets.
- Jgrubb 2y agoYeah, I'd say two hours a week, maybe an hour. Feeding and watering and checking for eggs can be done quite quickly when it's below freezing out :)
- UtopiaPunk 2y agoYeah, the daily tasks are pretty small. Just a few minutes a day. Scoop some food, change out the water, gather the eggs. Every so often, you need to do bigger chores, like go buy fees or fix something in your setup. A couple times a year you need to do a deep clean of the coop (throw out all the straw, scrape any poo that's collected on the floor or wherever, put in clean straw). Sometimes a chicken dies, and that's not fun, but it is something you have dispose of properly. Ultimately, though, it's a hobby. It should be fun or relaxing most of the time or else it's not worth it. Like gardening or running a home server. If you're trying to just save money, maybe you can save a tiny bit in this particular moment, but there are surely better ways to save a few bucks.
- 0xEF 2y agoWhat are your thoughts on a more communal approach? Say we have a neighborhood of 20 single family homes that all participate in tending a large garden and raising chickens. Would the cost and chore time drop to a level where it was saving all involved enough money to justify the effort? I ask because I used to have a good sized garden at my old house, growing enough veggies to both preserve and distribute to neighbors because I grossly underestimated the yield. While it was nice to have the neighbors love me, it was also a lot more work than I had bargained for (especially when otherwise working 40+ hours per week) and it got me thinking about community gardens and whatnot, why those might make more sense these days
- wakawaka28 2y agoYou're feeding them the wrong stuff. They can live off of cracked corn and whatever stale bread and vegetables you toss them, as well as bugs in their general vicinity. As for the initial buy, they can turn over a new generation in about 3 weeks. You can also eat the old chickens. You're looking at it wrong.
- Jgrubb 2y agoBecause I'm not looking at it the way you look at it? Been at it for ten years and am perfectly happy with how it's been going.
- defrost 2y agoThe spreadsheet in isolation view does seem odd to farming types. We have chickens, my father's still looking after them and he's had chooks since his birth in 1935 .. along with at least 10 fruit trees on any property we've had, potatoes, tomatoes, onions, garlic, herbs, pumpkins, and all the usual stuff that you can sow and that grows pretty well on its own (we've all had other jobs .. but this all stems from either growing acres of grain in some wings of the family or raising cattle in remote parts of Australia far from regular shops). Point being, chickens do well on picking through big piles of rotting down compost from everything else so feed costs are low, return on having chicken shit turned into soil that can be used for the next garden bed is high, value of having bugs kept in check is saving on sprays, etc. By all means keep a spreadsheet, I'm fond of them also, but having had chooks for decades we see them more as an integrated component of a bigger picture.
- matwood 2y agoYour post got me thinking about where I am right now in my life. We’re planning how we want to retire and recently bought an old home that has a smattering of produce trees. Citrus, olives, figs, and walnuts. Learning how to deal with them (with help from the neighbors) has been stressful, but also very satisfying after mainly being in front of a computer for 20+ years.
- eleveriven 2y agoYeah, definitely not a money-saver, especially with high-quality feed