medicated or not????

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Hi, hope someone can give me an answer..I will be ordering 6 laying hens, at 20 weeks of age, so ready to lay, along with 15 meat birds as day olds, plan to keep the two seperate but have conflicting answers about feed, do either require medicated feed? thanks for the help

-- pattie DeRoche (pattieroc@yahoo.com), March 17, 2002

Answers

Hi, I have to say no to medicated feed-if any of my animals get sick,I medicate that animal. I finally found a feed mill that doesn't medicate everything and they get all my business even though some things are more expensive. I hatch out about 50 chicks every month and have never had to medicate them. Keep it clean,feed them well,and always have fresh water. Don't crowd them and let them scratch in the dirt and play in the sunshine. My only loses are to predators and an occasional loss from unknown causes. Same for my pigs-no iron suppliments or antibiotics-let them root in the dirt and self feed haven't lost one yet. Knock on wood. Give them they would have in nature or as close as possible. Well off the soap box. :>) Daryll

-- Daryll in NW FLA (twincrk@hotmail.com), March 17, 2002.

Pattie, I think the only reason antibiotics are put into feeds, is to make the birds grow faster and perhaps take less feed. The problem is, that those antibiotics cause the bacteria that do survive in the birds to be a very hardy strain... some you do NOT want to be around. Because if one of those hardy strains of bacteria makes you sick, you are gonna have a hard time finding an antibiotic that will get you better!

Medicated animal feeds is one of the main reasons we are hearing of people dying from common sicknesses in the hospitals... the bacteria strains have been bred to resist our medicines.

-- daffodyllady (daffodyllady@yahoo.com), March 17, 2002.


Medicated feed with amprol is a good idea for day old chicks Most chick starters have it in , it prevents coccidious (bloody stool) this can cause death or poor doing chicks. Layer feed should not be medicated. Steve

-- (smhamp@hotmail.com), March 17, 2002.

Something that folks fail to realize is there's TWO kinds of medicated feed. There's feed with antibiotics, which never made sense to me! -G- And there's feed with Amprolium to help prevent the birds from getting coccidiosis. The amount of Amprolium is minimum ~ not enough to cure if the birds get the disease ~ just enough to build up their immunity.

-- ~Rogo (rogo2222@hotmail.com), March 18, 2002.

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