What is your experience with feeding Diatomaceous Earth to your chickens?

[farlo4]

I have the food safe Diatomaceous Earth that I feed to my horses. I absolutely LOVE this stuff. The summer before I fed it to them, there were so many flies that they covered my horse's muzzle even with a fly mask on. The summer after I started feeding it, the flies were there but there were so little that my horse didn't even need a fly mask. My horses also have shiny coats, and I haven't had worm problems. I SWEAR by this stuff for my horses, but I'm wondering how it would do with my chickens? I just got 6 new chicks - they are about 2 weeks old now. This is my first time owning chickens, so it's been an adventure to say the least. What is your experience with feeding D.E. to your chickens? Is it better for mature chickens then for chicks? Have you noticed it prevent worms and flies? Is it bad for chickens? Please let me know Thanks in advance!

 

[Messipaw]

I use food grade DE for everything. In their food. In their DB even directly on them. I mix the DE with sweet PDZ in the coop all over. I throw in some sevrn dust and all is fine.

 

[chooks4life]

Hello and

D.E. is great stuff and if you've got the grade that works on horses that will also work on chickens.

Newly hatched chicks, up to a month or two old, won't have adult worms in them and I think you could safely wait until that long to add it to their diet, but asides from that, chickens are fine with D.E. I haven't heard of it harming chicks and if it was harmful to small animals, there wouldn't be any small native animals in the regions where D.E. naturally occurs.

Many people get a poor quality grade and complain it doesn't work. Not all D.E.s are equal. Fresh raw garlic from hatching onwards will take care of disease and parasites in chicks and also works wonders for adults.

I haven't had fly problems so don't know if it works for them but I'd assume it would, in good quality and high enough exposure.

Best wishes.

 

[Spangled]

It's good to have you here!

You know, we've been feeding food grade diatomaceous earth at a rate of 1% (yes, we weight and mix it all in) for years. We feed it from day 1 to the chicks, but it's mixed into their feed at 1%. All the chickens get it. I forgot all about the fly benefits, probably because we don't have any to speak of ... but I always just think we live in a low fly area. I think we probably have more flies in the house than we do in the chicken area. Wow, I should pay better attention.

We live more northerly than southerly, so the freezing temps for months in the north is great for killing off many worms and other nasties in the environment that the chickens would normally live near (or with) all year 'round if we lived in a warmer area. But truthfully, we don't get many problems with our chickens. There's no way that it could all be attributable to food grade diatomaceous earth, but you'd think it plays a small part. I mean, there are a lot of glowing reports (anecdotal evidence) for food grade diatomaceous earth out there for farm critters and humans, too, so I tend to think that it's making a difference of some sort to their health. One thing is almost for certain: We're not experiencing deaths from the use of food grade Diatomaceous Earth.

 

[Tacswa3]

If one were to add it to the chicken feed, whats a good ratio? 1% as spangled mentioned? For example, 2 pounds of feed, mix in 1/3 oz of DE?

 

[FarmalI]

What is Diatomaceous Earth and what is its purpose?

 

[WGAchick]

I have a bag of food grade DE that I bought for another purpose. It's unopened but I've had it about 2 years. Procrastination! Is it still o.k. to feed to horses & chickens? Does it go bad or lose potency?

How much do you feed a horse? I have a senior horse out on pasture but he eats a little grain in the morning I could mix it with along with his supplements.

 

[farlo4]

I have a bag of food grade DE that I bought for another purpose. It's unopened but I've had it about 2 years. Procrastination! Is it still o.k. to feed to horses & chickens? Does it go bad or lose potency?

How much do you feed a horse? I have a senior horse out on pasture but he eats a little grain in the morning I could mix it with along with his supplements.

I would say it would be okay, as long as it isn't moldy/smelly.
I feed mine 1 scoop a day. I use a cup that you would find on a childs medicine bottle for my scoop. I've read that you can feed up to half cup per day, but I've never had to. Here is a nice article on it.

http://howtousediatomaceousearth.com/uses/ants/cattlehorses/

What is Diatomaceous Earth and what is its purpose?

Check out the web page I posted above and it will explain all about it. Basically it eliminates worms/parasites inside the animal as well as prevents bugs from getting in their droppings. It has also been proven to increase the overall health of your animals. You can mix it with grains to prevent bugs getting into the bag. You can sprinkle it around to kill and prevent bugs from crawling around in, for example, you chicken coop.

 

[clankeyes]

Where do you buy food grade DE ? I have seen it at the Feed Store with all the other chicken foods and such. BUT is that FOOD grade ????

 

[earthfriendlyfarm]

Codex is is what is called Food Grade. There actually two types of Diatomaceous Earth or D.E. One is for pool water and filtering which is poisonous and the other is Codex food Grade. This one is used to feed to chickens, horses, cats, dogs and people as well as sprinkle on the chicken house floors and gardens areas to kill soft body bugs. Couple things to mention. Always make sure you question that the D.E. you buy is in fact Food grade. And then when you use it for a bug killer, DO NOT get it in your eyes or lungs or any critters. As it burns and stings like crazy. It is made from tiny Diatoms which are just little stickly, pricky looking things and they thrash the soft body bugs and they dehydrate and die. And they do this to soft tissue as well. It is also similiar to a bentonite clay with its mineral content, so good for everyone there too. Question I have been wondering about is research I read which said D.E. will dissolve in water and no longer have the parasite killing properties it has dry. Sooooo, our mouths, tummies etc. are all wet. How do it work for antiparasitic?