From Newbie to Expert: Essential Chicken Keeping Tips and Strategies Part 3
Nov 14, 2023Season 1Episode 21
Rip Stalvey, John Gunterman, and Mandelyn Royal
Ready for a deep dive into the world of poultry nutrition? We're shedding light on everything you need to know. From tailored feed formulas to winter feed adjustments, no details are spared. We delve into the very backbone of poultry health and productivity, discussing the differences between regular chicken feed and game bird feed. All of this knowledge is fortified with insights from Jeff's book, Niche Poultry Nutrition, and Management, an essential read for all poultry enthusiasts.
But nutrition isn't the only concern for poultry keepers, predators lurk at every corner, from your household pets to fierce birds of prey. We're addressing this common worry by exploring predator behavior, specifically in urban environments, and providing you with practical strategies to safeguard your flock. We're even discussing the effectiveness of avian outdoor netting – a simple yet powerful tool in predator management.
Lastly, we're offering a treasure trove of resources for poultry keepers. Learn about the Hubbard Breeder Management Guide and the Livestock Conservancy's Heritage Poultry Manual, and how they can streamline your poultry management journey. We're also touching upon the significance of biosecurity and the potential of student field trips for hands-on learning. Plus, we'll discuss a critical aspect of poultry health – obesity, and how diet modifications can ensure the long-term well-being of your birds. So, tune in, this episode is your one-stop resource for all things poultry.
Ready for a deep dive into the world of poultry nutrition? We're shedding light on everything you need to know. From tailored feed formulas to winter feed adjustments, no details are spared. We delve into the very backbone of poultry health and productivity, discussing the differences between regular chicken feed and game bird feed. All of this knowledge is fortified with insights from Jeff's book, Niche Poultry Nutrition, and Management, an essential read for all poultry enthusiasts.
But nutrition isn't the only concern for poultry keepers, predators lurk at every corner, from your household pets to fierce birds of prey. We're addressing this common worry by exploring predator behavior, specifically in urban environments, and providing you with practical strategies to safeguard your flock. We're even discussing the effectiveness of avian outdoor netting – a simple yet powerful tool in predator management.
Lastly, we're offering a treasure trove of resources for poultry keepers. Learn about the Hubbard Breeder Management Guide and the Livestock Conservancy's Heritage Poultry Manual, and how they can streamline your poultry management journey. We're also touching upon the significance of biosecurity and the potential of student field trips for hands-on learning. Plus, we'll discuss a critical aspect of poultry health – obesity, and how diet modifications can ensure the long-term well-being of your birds. So, tune in, this episode is your one-stop resource for all things poultry.
Hi, welcome to the poultry keepers podcast. I'm john gunterman and, together with mandolin royal and rips talby, where your co-hosts for the show and is our mission to help you have a happy, healthy and productive flock.
Speaker 2:
We've been talking about nutrition a lot, but I think one thing we need to touch on is when can folks get good nutritional advice? Now, you gotta be careful when you get the internet sites, because there's good advice and there's advice and there's really poor advice. The one that and john mentioned the one I suggested If you're on facebook, go to poultry breeders nutrition at the site that was created by jeff maddox. Jeff is a livestock nutritionist. He's been doing this for years and years and years and he's gotten a lot of on the ground experience. Jeff has written a book that I'd suggest you get. I know, john, I've worn out.
Speaker 1:
My second copy.
Speaker 2:
now Are you worn out? Your second copy already?
Speaker 3:
maybe you need bigger, but I know I this is perfect because it fits in the most gene back pocket.
Speaker 1:
I mean it's designed to be a quick reference guide that you keep on you. I would like it to be made out of a water proof material with Same size would be great you just need a laminated addition well, you know what a proof and now puppy proof addition is. He's chewing on everything.
Speaker 2:
But that book is called niche poultry nutrition and management, is written by jeff maddox. You gotta get your copy that you can go to fur trails Online dot w w w dot. Fur trail f e r t r e l dot com and you can order. It will be the best investment in poultry nutrition you ever make in your life.
Speaker 2:
He talks about nutrition. There's feed formulas in there, there's a good discussion about all the different feed ingredients there, and you know he gets into more than just poultry feed he's he spent a year, years and years and years studying poultry, not only their nutritional needs but the management that they seem to perform better under, and so he talks a lot about management. He talks about management and nutrition for heritage style poultry breeds. Talks about it for commercial too. But he's the only nutrition I have ever come across that will talk about and work with Heritage breed breed poultry rather than the commercial types, because it's night and day well, the needs are expense and if jeff we're here, he tell you folks is if you have a question, you have a problem, email him.
Speaker 2:
Contact him at jeff maddox at fur trail dot com. He may shoot.
Speaker 1:
If you're doing that, it gives it out all the time, actually he, so a couple of, was it Rachel and bailer and himself. I think it's just live stock nutrition. That for trail dot com names got a whole team of people. Just you tell them where you live, you know, give them your zip code or your usd a zone and what grains you have available or how you want to carry out your husbandry, and they'll give you a grain bill. That's super easy to follow. Now I'm looking at you know we're coming into winter and I've got to start changing my fat level and changing my level a little bit to keep my birds a little warmer in the winter. And then we're gonna look at a winter layer specific formula For February and March and just very slight changes to overall levels and the birds respond and you could really target your nutrition and save money. Never overfeed it costs money you don't need to spend Got your big time and feed great.
Speaker 2:
You know great will save you percent.
Speaker 1:
It'll get you 10 to 15 percent higher feed conversion without it you've already put this nutrition into your bird without the grit in the gizzard, in the gizzard action to grind it and help extract that. They're just pooping out at least 10%, yeah and if you can increase that. You just say that much money and it's the least expensive thing you can give them.
Speaker 2:
What's your question, mandy?
Speaker 3:
so I see this is gonna.
Speaker 2:
I was gonna say this is gonna be a good one. I can tell you've been saving up.
Speaker 3:
Well, I'm just listening to you guys go on and on and I see a lot of questions online of people who raise dual purpose poultry and they want those gains and they want to get that table result. Some of them are swearing by feeding 26% protein, 28% protein game bird feeds and all this stuff. But I want to say I heard somewhere that the birds cannot even Process metabolize that? Yeah, they can't metabolize past. Was it 24% or 22%?
Speaker 3:
that's about it 2224% is a couple of inhibitors that block that uptake the rest of us just coming out the back side. So those feeds are more expensive and if you're wasting 4% coming out the back side, what's that difference? Is it because I know, game for game, bird feeds have a more complex nutrient content?
Speaker 2:
The reason they're seeing more, what I should say the reason they're seeing better results, is because game bird feed or higher in amino acids than regular chicken feed that they're pumping out there buying more protein to bring up the amino acid levels.
Speaker 1:
The only way to use raw protein to bring that up is to increase the levels rather than just add those amino acids, which is more expensive to do.
Speaker 3:
So it's not. The protein is the added density of the meal and it.
Speaker 1:
by comparison, the manure is going to be stickier and oil or your oh, it's so bad. I mean, they're getting what they need, but they're getting too much. Yeah and the other end. They have to eat all this protein to get their basic building blocks.
Speaker 2:
So and that game bird feed. You put game bird feed on the side of a feedback. The price goes way up.
Speaker 3:
Oh, it can be as much as 10 bucks a bag or more.
Speaker 1:
I was raising quail on game bird starter and you know I said, jeff, can we do any better? Like, oh yeah, easily. And now we've got him, you know, waving his flag and tooting his horn over on Katernick's corner and a couple of the quail sites, because, yeah, everybody's, everybody's overfeeding their birds in the quail world and it gets really expensive because people usually tend to keep couple hundred at a time.
Speaker 3:
Why slack off on turkeys this year? Because turkey feed for the starter was 30 bucks For every 50 pounds yeah, that was a $10 rise from the season before and that was just the regular 26 percent turkey starter.
Speaker 2:
I know that folks are listening to us thinking big bucks, big bucks, big bucks for premium feed. It can be, but it doesn't always happen that way. But honestly, we can't feed our birds based on a cost driven perspective. If you want high quality birds, you gotta have a high quality feed. That's going to cost you a little bit more. Now I'll give you the example. The feed I use is 3M farms out of Lancaster, pennsylvania, and it shipped down here to Florida. I don't worry about it being older, stale or anything. The first bag I got was manufactured. It has a manufacturer date on the tag. Was manufactured three days before I bought it.
Speaker 3:
Nice.
Speaker 2:
Honestly, it smelled good enough to eat, like John was saying.
Speaker 3:
I just add a little milk, and now it's cereal.
Speaker 2:
A little milk, a little sugar.
Speaker 1:
I'm good to go, but well, if they're using one of Jeff's formulations, it's going to taste a little fishy, so you got to watch out for that.
Speaker 2:
I priced it. I did a price comparison because I was very shocked when he told me how much he wanted for a bag of it. I bought that feed. It's a premium, high quality feed, fresh for two dollars, a bag less than Purina Chick starter.
Speaker 3:
Nice.
Speaker 1:
And there's no amproleum in there which is going to mess up the diet and mess up the bird.
Speaker 2:
No, fillers, no fluff, just all good stuff.
Speaker 3:
And then they're going to turn around and eat less of it.
Speaker 2:
Oh yeah, I feed. I figure I'm feeding 15 to 20 less feed on this premium feed than I was with the other feed. You know, if folks, if you got chickens and you go out there with a bucket of feed, if they're rushing up to meet you every single time, probably feeding the inferior feed because they're, they're literally star for nutrition, and when they come up to meet you there may still be feed in the feeder. It's the stuff they don't want. It's because they don't get. They're not getting the nutrition they need. You know Jeff likes to describe there's two, three types of feeds. There's feed that he refers to as a deprived feed, feed that he refers to as a survive feed and that higher level, the thrive feed, the pride, doesn't do much for them at all, it's not even barely alive, laying in that you're 16% lay out and the survive feed does a little bit change percent, but it's still lacking in nutrition.
Speaker 2:
But the thrive feed, those premium quality feeds that are formulated right, man, your birds do so much better on them. They grow better, they look better, they perform better, the eggs hatch better, the chicks are stronger and it's just a small difference.
Speaker 1:
It's like it's not even calculable to pennies per pound. It's so much smaller than that, it's like pennies per bag.
Speaker 2:
Well, when I found out the starter I bought was two dollars a bag less than Purina starter, I'd never felt like well you also have to consider the handling that goes into it.
Speaker 1:
All commercial feed starts out as a whole grain and all this stuff, the mash, and instead of being put into a pellet mill and pelletized, then into a bag, it just comes straight to you. So you've already removed that step and you've destroyed it. I mean that 30 day clock is because you just broke all those nice whole grains. You're getting them delivered fresh and crumbles are just broken down pellets, so everything that you're doing is oxidizing your feed and, you know, staling out faster.
Speaker 2:
I'm going to say that it can be very difficult to find a good, high quality feed. You could ask around, just couldn't find one, and Florida is a feed desert, trust me.
Speaker 1:
You know, luckily you found somebody who's importing a great quality feed and, from what I understand, they're making this available to other poultry breeders in the area. You know, as long as you want to drive out there and get it, he'll get it on the next pallet for you.
Speaker 2:
I don't even he. I live in Lakeland. He's in Wachula, an hour and a half drive from me. Well, he comes up to plant city, to the state farmers market. He buys produce a couple of times a week. He's well, I just bring it to you, so I don't even have to. I got a 15 minute drive to go pick up feed and you met a new poultry funder. Yes, but you know, search, look, talk to other folks, find out what they're feeding. Look for folks that are that are feeding these high quality feeds.
Speaker 1:
Ask them where they got asked look in, look in the yellow pages for the feed mill that's been there for 50 or 100 years. That's. Those are the people you want to talk to.
Speaker 2:
They'll work with you, but don't come on strong to them, because these are mom and pop operations and they're kind of setting their ways.
Speaker 3:
My guy's definitely setting his ways. He's been doing this as a family business gosh since like the 1940s maybe.
Speaker 1:
Well, if you can bring in a feed bill like that Jeff makes or it's been looked over by somebody who knows what they're doing and say, hey, I'd like to see if I can get something like this to feed my chickens I'm a breeder. I need everything to be fresh and highest possible quality. An experienced feed person will look at it and go, oh okay, you actually know a little bit about what you're talking about because you're handing me something that I understand and recognize just by looking at the formulation, what you're doing.
Speaker 2:
Sometimes you may be in an area, like we are here in Florida, where it's very, very difficult to find a high quality feed. I could find one, but it was a three hour drive. It's going to cost you.
Speaker 1:
I mean finding the right place that you sync with and you mesh with is also very important too.
Speaker 2:
But you may be able and this is what Caleb did. He actually brought feed down here from Lancaster, pennsylvania. He has it trucked in once a week because he raises a lot of pasture poultry for both meat and for eggs not just chickens but turkeys and ducks and geese and the whole nine yards down there. But maybe you can partner with somebody to get some feed trucked in. Now there's going to be a minimum order, usually 500 to 1,000 pounds in most instances. Yeah, it's going to cost you a little bit to get it shipped in, but you're going to save money in the long run feeding the higher quality feed. Check into that.
Speaker 1:
Just make sure you get an appropriate amount for what you're going to feed through and an appropriate amount of time. Yeah, don't over buy. Yeah, don't fall into that trap. But other than that it's great. Everybody wins.
Speaker 2:
And if you're really up against the wall and you cannot find a good feed, then it's time to think about adding a feed supplement, and the one that I always recommend and we've already talked about it is the first rail showbird and breeder supplement, because it'll actually take your feed and make it more complete. It will get it up to the nutritional levels those optimum thrive levels is just, Jeff would call it to where they do really really good. And I know we talk about first rail on here and you think, oh man, man, they're getting paid to do that. We don't make a dime off of mentioning first rail.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, I still have to buy it at first price. I don't even get a coupon code?
Speaker 1:
Yeah, I don't think it has coupon codes, but you know it's not where you want to try and save money and between the breeder supplement and the NutriBalancer, you're going to get right where you need to be, even if you have to use a 16% off the shelf. Commercial bag. Reach out to Jeff or anybody in the Facebook group is like this is what I've got. How much of this and this do I need to bring me to optimal levels? And it's usually like a teaspoon or a tablespoon per some fixed amount and you're good. I don't want to encourage people to buy that feed if they can avoid it, but you can supplement it.
Speaker 3:
I think the best way to save money with your birds is to scab them with your own.
Speaker 1:
I got eggs coming in. That's funny.
Speaker 2:
You know something we talked about earlier. We just I shouldn't say we talked about it, we touched on earlier and that is predators. If you're just getting started in poultry, it's not a matter of if but when, because sooner or later you're going to find predators going after your birds. Our biggest predators here that I have to deal with now are house cats, hawks and the odd occasional coon.
Speaker 3:
Statistically speaking, the number one predator is your own dog and the number two predator is your neighbor's dog. After that, then it's wildlife, and where we are we have raccoon, bobcat, possum, skunk hawks, coyote, fox thankfully no bear.
Speaker 2:
You've got predators that will dig in to get to your birds. They'll actually tunnel under your pens. What I have found helpful is I put welded wire two foot strip of welded wire down around all my pens so that kind of prevents that digging in situation.
Speaker 3:
Yes, skirting helps a lot. One thing I do want to mention, though for all of our urban flock keepers, we had a far higher predator load when we were in the city than we are now. In the country when we are now, there's hardly any action, but when we were urban, raccoons were every single night. Possums every single night, hawks all day, every day. Because there's such a higher density of what they eat available in those urban settings, I would hazard yes, it's more dangerous to keep chickens in the city.
Speaker 2:
Do you know why there's more in the city than there is in the city? We've spliced them in their habitat. The biggest single cause is folks leaving out dog and cat food overnight.
Speaker 3:
Oh yeah, bring them in, and the moment that food is gone, they start looking for other opportunities.
Speaker 1:
And if you're supplementing your feed with things that usually has a fish product and those raccoons and other scavengers really love fish protein it'll draw them in. So I try not to feeders overnight, try to empty them. They're just going to call in predators and scavengers.
Speaker 2:
So you know we talked about the dirty diggers that come after your birds and also those dastardly climbers that will go straight up the wire on your coop and over the top if you don't have it covered in or if you don't have a wire top on it.
Speaker 3:
How big of a gap does a raccoon need to gain access?
Speaker 2:
If he can get his head in something, he can get the rest of them in there.
Speaker 3:
Isn't it something like three inches?
Speaker 2:
About that three, four inches, something like that.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, it's not much of an opening they need and they'll kill for sport. They don't even take what they need and leave, they'll kill everything.
Speaker 1:
They'll kill everything and then come back and feed is their mentality. The ermine will do the same thing. One little ermine or weasel will take out three or four birds and then they'll drag pieces back to their den for their young.
Speaker 2:
Another predator that I have to deal with around here is birds of prey. Now they're protected by federal law, so I can't take extreme measures, but what I'll do is I'll string a monofilament line about every five to six inches all the way across the top of my pen to stretch it real tight. They don't have to hit that, but about once and before they just get the idea that that's not a good idea.
Speaker 3:
I switched over to the nylon UV rated avian outdoor netting.
Speaker 2:
Does that hold up pretty good, Mandy.
Speaker 3:
It holds up so much better than because at one season I tried a plastic netting and it was toast, the first winner. As soon as we got an ice storm it broke everything but the nylon. I think it's got like a two inch gap on it. So it's not good for overnight predators but for daytime aerial. It'll also let leaves and sticks fall through. It has a good tensile strength for holding larger branches that fall, because I do have two giant maple trees over our runs for shade.
Speaker 1:
That'll help too, because if it breaks up their glide or attack path, anything that you could do to scatter their attack path and not give them a clean shot at your birds is going to help.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, they have to come in from the side, like the runs that are directly underneath that maple tree, the bigger one. I don't even have netting over top of it. I only put netting over the pens that have direct open air access. I tried a string and it worked, but it deteriorated. It wasn't UV rated but I get two, three years out of the actual avian netting.
Speaker 2:
I may switch over to using it, then it's a lot easier to install. I know I put some up Now. This has been years ago and, like you said, it lasted about a year and I thought as much as I had to pay for that stuff. Of course it back then it was a new rage and it was expensive. I thought it just. 12 months protection, that's kind of pricey.
Speaker 1:
Let's see, oh, hubbard Breeder Management Guide where what else we got daytime, nighttime, domestic Aerial. So daytime and nighttime predator, mm-hmm. So we got aerial predators. We have Eagles. And what's that big owl the one that hit me in the head that night? Great, great horn owl? Yeah, it was up in a tree Directly above my poultry yard and it swooped down one night and hit me in the back of the head. But it never messes with my chickens yet. But one thing that I I specifically want them to have very good predator awareness. So I do naturally select for that. In the winter, when the fences come down, they're on their own and if they get predated then they're automatically out of the breeding pool.
Speaker 2:
And you know what?
Speaker 1:
we need that up here. People rely on that because we're not, you know, city dwellers. City dwelling has its own bag of tricks between the domestic animals and the humans, and Cats are a much higher density, dogs are much higher density. I mean, everything's just packed in and it's putting so much pressure on the birds.
Speaker 3:
When I was living in the city and I had some bannums. I was kind of in between living situations at the time and I was crashing with my dad While my husband was doing his military service. So I just had a small little six bird flock of bannums to keep me busy while I was waiting on the next night you can't not have birds. Right, even my first apartment, I had a trio of ceramic.
Speaker 2:
Where there's a wheel, there's a way exactly.
Speaker 3:
But I was in the backyard hanging out with the birds and all of a sudden this hawk came swooping at the perfect angle and he had hid himself behind the stockade fence. So he came down in another yard and then just came up and over the fence so fast and I had just enough time to stomp my feet at the birds and scatter them, so he missed. But he came down like not even six feet from me. Oh yeah, there didn't stop that bird.
Speaker 2:
While I have today, are a much more Tolerant of you.
Speaker 1:
You're not a threat, you're not a predator 30 or 40 years. Yeah, they've learned not to fear man. Yeah we do have an interesting phenomenon up here. We've got this coyote dog wolf hybrid that's made its way across the upper side of the Great Lakes and down into Vermont and we've got the first confirmed DNA tested Case, like in our town, which is pretty cool or not? And they have no fear whatsoever. And there they're a scary looking mix. I Don't want to tangle with them. I Definitely keep that fence hot at night.
Speaker 1:
They look like they could be a fairly aggressive critter to deal with and they're they're Replacing a lot as the apex predator in the area, which is going to cause a whole tropic cascade among species. And you know, the environmentalist portion of my education makes me a little worried. But we'll see what happens.
Speaker 3:
Our local coyote are only just now learning how to live in a pack environment instead of the solo loner Avenue. They're realizing they can take down deer if they group together.
Speaker 1:
So they are if there's a niche, a species is going to fill it.
Speaker 2:
Let's talk about and then we're getting to the tail end of our reporting here. But let's talk about Management resources that people can go to. So so many I. I see so many podcasts and I get upset because they don't. They tell Me what to do but they don't tell me resources I Learned more about. But I want to be sure that we do that. One of the ones that Jeff Maddox recommended to me was the Hubbard breeder management guide. It's put out by Hubbard poultry breeders and it's a free download. You just go on to, you can do a search for Hubbard, hubbard, hubbard Breeder Management Guide and you can find out it. Just you download that free PDF and you're good to go. But it has lots of Management to. Their talk about water, they talk about nutrition, they talk about space, they talk about airflow, but Jeff said that's the closest thing. He's found this commercially available, that is applicable to Heritage and if you want to dive super deep.
Speaker 1:
They've mapped it out on lighting and feed and such schedules from hatch. Basically they've got a 15-minute clock For optimum performance. You put your birds on this light cycle for the first three days and then this light cycle and they've mapped out all the way to finishing. It's incredible and how to save money and produce the best quality birds.
Speaker 2:
Another resource that we've already talked about. It is just book niche poultry Management and our nutrition and management. You can get that at portrayalcom. You're gonna You're really gonna be glad you bought your first read through.
Speaker 1:
It's gonna save you twice. Which paid for it?
Speaker 2:
yes, absolutely and there are some colleges or universities that are now working with small backyard block owners and John. You're probably more familiar with some of these, but I know the one that I have found very helpful and Pretty darn good information is.
Speaker 1:
University can tell you Jackie Jacobs is series on Dr Jacobs is.
Speaker 2:
She does great vodka.
Speaker 1:
Absolutely. It's a little higher level than we're aiming for but it's a great companion. I highly recommend it. I did just come out of a college environment working with a heritage flock of Buckeyes mostly. That was very interesting. Working with three or 400 birds versus just a couple. It changes your perspective. But there's an amazing resource Most colleges that have poultry programs.
Speaker 1:
You got to search for them. But if they have one, as long as you follow basic biosecurity dip your feet in the little solution on the way in and put on the Tyvek suit. You can come on and look around and they love sharing the information. But don't be shocked or off-put by the biohazard protocols that you're going to need to go through to get on. Be grateful that they're there and learn from them. Employ them on your own flock. I think there's more of a biohazard concern to birds, especially with high pathogen avian influenza flying over. I live right on a pond that's got 200 Canada geese and a bunch of Bufflehead and Grebe and Loon that are getting ready to take off for the year. I have a very high risk environment and I need to keep that from getting in my birds.
Speaker 2:
Absolutely. There's another, and I didn't have it on my list, but another one I wanted to mention. The Livestock Conservancy has a heritage poultry manual. It will talk you through the management technique. It will talk you through selection processes. It was written by Don Strider. I've known Don for many, many years. That's what the college used.
Speaker 1:
They were part of the restoration project and they followed that manual exactly for the first several years and then diverged.
Speaker 2:
Man, he's got a program in there that works, if you use it right.
Speaker 1:
Another important thing about the colleges and universities they usually have an animal sciences program and they vet techs, lab techs. They always need stool samples to test. See if somebody around has it. Send your samples in, have them test for the various things. But don't just get a positive, negative. Get an actual count on the fecal floats and establish a healthy level. Or get a microscope and learn how to do it yourself. It's not hard, it's not disgusting and it's actually pretty cool.
Speaker 1:
But the colleges and universities usually have yeah it's not hard to make a wet mount and count.
Speaker 3:
As soon as you know your colors and shapes of what you're looking for.
Speaker 2:
You know folks don't be alarmed if you see a few. Oo's or the occasional worm or so that's normal. You want to see that, like Jeff Maddox says, I think if I was to do a fecal float test and I didn't find something, I would be alarmed because I was thinking I got a bunch of chickens about ready to die.
Speaker 1:
Well, that's why I said don't ask for a positive or a negative, get a count, Establish your healthy level and if it starts to raise or fall from there. You know, it's almost always a husbandry practice that needs to be cleaned up.
Speaker 3:
No, we haven't even touched on the subject of internal parasites really much at all, oh no.
Speaker 1:
That's maybe another episode or three or four, because it's all about husbandry.
Speaker 2:
That would be a good thing to bring Jeff Maddox to talk about?
Speaker 1:
Yeah well, he's got a busy schedule, but I bet you we can borrow him.
Speaker 3:
A little bit is totally normal, even encouraged, as part of maintaining their immune function. The overloaded instances when it deteriorates the bird it's nine times out of 10, a secondary problem to a bigger problem elsewhere.
Speaker 2:
Yes, yes, yes.
Speaker 3:
Well, the other thing about the universities that we didn't really touch on is some of them are going to have a lab who can help you out if you need further diagnostics, like if you're losing birds and you can't figure out why. Sending them samples can get you some answers. That is a little more economical than sending them to like a professional lab, because the students need to learn how to do that stuff too, for whatever profession they're going to go into. But about their lab programs and see how they can help you out.
Speaker 1:
Or you can invite them over for field trips. You know I'm working out a field trip because they can't do it at the local college campus for various reasons, but I need it to learn how to do it. So I'm inviting some 200 level animal science students out to practice k-Ponizing as humanely as possible.
Speaker 3:
You're going to teach them on condavers first, or go live.
Speaker 1:
They're going to teach themselves. I'm just the facilitator.
Speaker 2:
Another thing that for resources, people might check into a lot of times. Your state department of agriculture will do some testing for you.
Speaker 1:
In Ohio we have the Ohio Poultry Association Well everybody should look at getting NPIP certified, Whether they plan on shipping or not. Most states will send an inspector out and blood test your chickens for all the important diseases and give you a two thumbs up and a high five and you're done. And a lot of states don't even charge for it.
Speaker 2:
There's no cost for that here in Florida, not even for the AI.
Speaker 3:
In Ohio it's 75 bucks.
Speaker 1:
Regardless of flock size. Awesome.
Speaker 3:
So whether I have 50 birds or 200 birds, they do a percentage of the flock for the same price.
Speaker 1:
And all it is is checking some boxes, that you're performing good husbandry practices and your birds aren't infected.
Speaker 3:
I love our tester. He's a bird nerd through and through and he is absolutely ecstatic that his day job has him at a different flock every day of the week, all year long. He services all of Southern Ohio but he gets out of his car here and he's excited. He's happy, he's ready to go. And then we start diving into bird evaluations. One season he told me my birds were too fat, he was having a hard time hitting the vein and the wing when they do the, the blood test, and he was like you need to put these birds on a diet. And I'm like, really why? And he showed me. He showed me exactly what obesity looks like without having to open that bird up. And I was like, yeah, I see it, you're right.
Speaker 1:
But, coming from that totally different perspective, but the same diagnosis, I think you're going to, you're going to get the answer, no matter how you look, as long as you look.
Speaker 2:
Thank you for joining us this week. Before you go, make sure you subscribe to our podcast so you can receive new episodes right when they're released and they're released every Tuesday. And if you're enjoying this podcast, we'd like to ask you to drop us an email at poultrykeeperspodcast at gmailcom and share your thoughts about the show. Thank you again for joining us for this episode of the poultry keepers podcast. We'll see you next week.