I, Farm Boy! WE MAKE OUR OWN FEEDS, EXPENSE REDUCED BY 30%

With the population of Manok Pinoy breeders in the farm growing exponentially, the feed consumption has also greatly increased causing a great strain on our finances.

This made me decide to prepare our own feeds for the chicken in the free-range to reduce our feeds expense.

Submitting a list of available materials, I sought the help of an animal nutritionist from a big animal feeds company in formulating chicken feeds without any synthetic ingredients.

Since I have a hammer mill and a ribbon mixer, it is easy for us to mix our own feeds using the following materials in producing 100 kilos of feeds with a CP of between 17% to 18%:

– Grains (Yellow Corn and Sorghum) – 55 kilos;

– Soya Meal – 15 kilos;

– Rice Bran – 10 kilos;

– Cassava – 6 kilos;

– Copra Meal – 5 kilos;

– Fish Meal – 5 kilos;

– Seaweeds – 2 kilos;

– Lime – 2 kilos.

Of these raw materials, only the Soya Meal is imported and we use US Soya Meal because of its good quality.

All the rest are available locally.

The introduction of processed seaweeds is my innovation having bought about 50 bags of Eco-Life Ulva Seaweeds feed supplement last year.

Since the price of Corn locally is only P12 per kilo, the same with Sorghum, and Cassava is only about P6 per kilo, our feed expense is reduced by at least 30%.

For our chicks, however, we still use commercial starter feeds up to about a month-old after which we gradually introduce our own feed formulation.

With this feeding system now, I am comfortable knowing that I know that the chicken whose meat and eggs I consume grew on feed materials which I know are safe for me, my children and those who will partake of my Manok Pinoy later.

Let me just clarify, however, that I am not recommending this feed formulation to other poultry growers because what works in my farm may not work in yours.

I am just sharing farm experiences which I hope other farmers could learn from.

#AgriculureIsPureCommonSense!

#SharingBestFarmPractices!

(All photos were taken by me or my farm workers, except the photos showing the corn which I downloaded from a public website and the Cassava field which was taken by the MinDA Media team in Matling Cassava Plantation in Malabang, Lanao del Sur.)