Scratch and Peck Whole Grain Starter Mash for Baby Chicks and Ducklings - 10 lb Bag - Corn and Soy-Free Feed with 20.5% Protein, Certified Organic and Non-GMO

Our chicks and ducklings appear to love uh the starter and in comparison to a friend using a different feed she lost over half her fowl and we have lost none. I like to think it’s due to the quality feed we are giving them. Our chick even started life with wry neck and with this starter and the electrolytes he was completely better in 12 hrs.

I looked into getting this as a less expensive option to the pellet feed and figured I'd try fermenting as I saw several recommendations for it- I'd already been mixing the pellet feed with water as the chickens prefer it and it's neater. At first they were interested but quickly lost interest and I went back to soaking the pellet feed. They do, however, like this feed dry and will go back and forth to the separate feeders during the day. It's kept them happy and laying eggs all winter, so I go with it. We like that it's organic, and corn and soy free.

My chickens are doing sooooo much better now! What a difference!!! Wish I gave them this feed years ago.

Easy to use, chickens love it

It seems nice to me and I like the ingredients. The chickens seem less enthusiastic about it, but they eat it. They were raised on pellets and they love the pellets most. These chickens were raised on just pellets and are not enthusiastic about most fresh foods. They seem to be laying well on it, but it's also spring and the day length is increasing.It's just so expensive. I was afraid to drive in the snow, but I will now buy chicken food locally. The organic ones here are crazy expensive, and the cheaper ones aren't just not organic, they have crappy ingredients.

This is the best quality chicken feed. I have not yet found a local brand that compares. I’ll be ordering monthly.

My vegan chickens said it was yummy... Tastes like chicken feed to me.

I've ordered Scratch & Peck feeds 3 or 4 times now and my chickens have gone crazy for it since day 1. You can definitely tell the difference in your flock when you give them a quality feed vs. the mass produced highly-processed crap they sell in most feed stores (the biggest difference that I've noticed is in the smell of their poop - much less potent when on this stuff). I love that you can actually see the grains in this feed, but the downside is that the chickens will pick out their favorites and leave the rest (at least that's been my case). There is some powder in this feed as well, which is more difficult for them to eat. You could add water to the powdery stuff and give it to them as a mash, but what I've been experimenting with recently is fermenting feed. I'm down to the last bit of the bag on their current feed, so much of my experimenting has been with the powder or bits that they "rejected", but you can ferment all the feed if you wish to do so (which I plan on doing with the next bag that I get).If you're not familiar with fermenting feed, here's a quick run-down:There are tons of benefits to fermenting - the process produces what are essentially probiotics (healthy bacteria) that promote digestive health. I've also read that the components of the feed are better utilized by the chickens' bodies after the feed is fermented - they don't have to eat as much to get the nutrients that they need (which saves you money, essentially, because it takes them longer to get through a bag of feed). Since fermentation produces a wet feed, they also don't require as much water. From the first day of offering this feed to them after it had fermented, I've noticed that their poop is well formed for the most part (not runny) and there is nearly no stink to it (yay!). Others have also reported healthier looking feathers and less illness (I haven't been fermenting long enough to see these benefits in my flock yet).The fermentation process is pretty simple - you just place some feed into a vessel/bucket, add a source of healthy bacteria (I use apple cider vinegar with "the mother"), and add enough water to cover the feed. You can also add other things to the mix that you would normally feed them (kitchen scraps, etc), though I haven't tried adding other components yet. Loosely cover the container (so gasses can escape & air can get it - you don't want to leave the container completely uncovered or it'll attract bugs... unless that's what you're going for, lol) and place the container in a location where it is somewhat warm and dark. After a day or two, you should notice the odor change to kind of a sour scent (if you've ever made sourdough bread or worked with a sourdough starter, it's along those same lines) and it'll get frothy - when this has occurred, it's ready to feed to the flock. If your birds are adults, it may take a day or two for them to "accept" it, though mine didn't really have an issue with it. There are tons more details about fermenting in the forum of the Backyard Chickens website - one of the threads on there is over 1000 pages long, lol (just search for fermented feed).From what I've seen, fermenting is definitely the way to go - it keeps the flock happy & healthy and it stretches the feed budget (win-win-win). This feed on it's own is great, but fermenting just takes it to the next level.