Desperate! Help needed with Grandpa Feeder

[Aretha Flapwing]

I have a Grandpa Feeder that I am now on my second attempt in getting my three bantams to use (one Pekin and two Silkies). The first stage where the treadle doesn't move always goes ok, but on the second stage my three bantams go on hunger strike. I'm on day 8 of the second stage (where the treadle moves a bit, but doesn't close completely). I have followed all the suggested advice for nervous chickens and done the following:

- Added weight to the underside of the treadle and put duct tape so it is far less noisy closing
- Created a ramp onto the treadle (attached to the treadle with duct tape and the ground with landscaping pins)
- A trail of treats on the ramp to the treadle (which are mostly uneaten)
- Blocked off the sides so they cannot side feed

If you manually move the treadle it hardly makes a sound now, but the movement completely freaked the girls out. Also one of my Silkie's turned into a complete bully, not letting the other bantams near the feeder. I've since put her on her own for a bit to see if that helps too.

If I manually place the hens on the treadle/ramp they will all eat, but they will not even step on the ramp/treadle on their own.

Should I just give up? I don't want the hens to get ill. I brought a treadle feeder for a number of reasons, rats in the area, so I could spend the odd evening away from my house and also because my chickens make a lot of noise if they have no food in the morning (waking up the neighbours in the summer).

Is there anyone out there more experience who could give me a bit of reassurance or some tips. I read all these posts about people hens just getting it, but myself and my hens are nervous wrecks now.

 

[Al Gerhart]

I have a Grandpa Feeder that I am now on my second attempt in getting my three bantams to use (one Pekin and two Silkies). The first stage where the treadle doesn't move always goes ok, but on the second stage my three bantams go on hunger strike. I'm on day 8 of the second stage (where the treadle moves a bit, but doesn't close completely). I have followed all the suggested advice for nervous chickens and done the following:

- Added weight to the underside of the treadle and put duct tape so it is far less noisy closing
- Created a ramp onto the treadle (attached to the treadle with duct tape and the ground with landscaping pins)
- A trail of treats on the ramp to the treadle (which are mostly uneaten)
- Blocked off the sides so they cannot side feed

If you manually move the treadle it hardly makes a sound now, but the movement completely freaked the girls out. Also one of my Silkie's turned into a complete bully, not letting the other bantams near the feeder. I've since put her on her own for a bit to see if that helps too.

If I manually place the hens on the treadle/ramp they will all eat, but they will not even step on the ramp/treadle on their own.

Should I just give up? I don't want the hens to get ill. I brought a treadle feeder for a number of reasons, rats in the area, so I could spend the odd evening away from my house and also because my chickens make a lot of noise if they have no food in the morning (waking up the neighbours in the summer).

Is there anyone out there more experience who could give me a bit of reassurance or some tips. I read all these posts about people hens just getting it, but myself and my hens are nervous wrecks now.

You are experiencing one of the many fatal flaws of the Chinese made Grandpa feeder along with the other Chinese made clones; the fact that the overhead lid forces them to advise that people train using the "training bolts".

First you have to bolt the lid up, the hens learn that the lid isn't supposed to move. Then it moves.....what are they to think? And now it makes noise.....

Blocking off the sides is good, forces them to come in from the front, but with those side guards it creates two huge pinch points that can injure chickens.

The ramp and the trail of treats, not good. First, the already too wide treadle is even wider, making it far less rodent proof than it already was. Plus you left a trail to lead the rodents right to the feed, plus the lid being blocked open, teaching the rodent exactly where the feed is located. Treadles should be narrow and distant so a hen can reach but a rat cannot. With banties though you do need a duck step but you can move the duck step back a bit each week until you have it as far away from the feed as possible and still allow the banties to use the feeder. Not perfect, but excluding rodents around silkies and banties is harder than with full size hens. Reach and weight difference are needed between the chicken and the rodent for a treadle feeder to work.

So far the training mistakes, other than the added ramp and trail of goodies are NOT your fault, the wretched design forces you into that.

But, here is another huge mistake on your part, one that you might not see coming. Logically, it makes sense, but chickens don't use logic, they use instinct and learned behavior.

Your mistake is setting the hen on the treadle instead of making her learn on her own. Now she expects to be put on the treadle if she is to eat. And she expects the lid not to move or make noise.

Now you have a bully hen, there will always be a bully hen, so to get around that you need either time or two feeders, one out of sight of the other.

None of this is your fault other than you should have researched before spending your hard earned money and taken the negative reviews much more seriously. With this feeder, most of the good reviews were from people that needed a feeder, not a rat proof feeder, or they had small sparrows as the pest. What makes this even harder to evade is all of the marketing done falsely claiming it is a rat proof feeder, done by the company and the affiliate sellers that do marvelous reviews accompanied with an Amazon link so they get paid a commission for convincing you to part with your hard earned money.

Sorry for the rant. You do see though that an oversold product catches a lot of consumers, that is why they oversell. They had a chance over a decade ago to see competition coming and improve their feeder but they are complacent. The Chinese eventually started making more feeders than Grandpa Feeders needed so the clones hit the market for half price so now they are in a downward spiral. All they had was their reputation.... from before there were no other alternatives other than one crappy wooden model.

Now, what you can do to help in order of most effectiveness.

Box it up and send it back before the return policy ends if you bought it off Amazon. Do more research and find independent reviews this time, buy a better feeder. Inward swinging door, spring loaded door to prevent vermin from just pushing the door open, adjustable spring tension to tweak it for your light weight hens, a narrow and distant treadle instead of the huge honking metal step, no plastic parts, and an add on duck step so you can gradually move the duck step back for fast training but still keep as much rat proof ability as possible. Even better, trim it down a bit each week. Just leave some room to push it forward an inch in case you go too far.

If you are past the Amazon return policy date, send it back to Grandpa Feeders. They have a two year guarantee. Find their main website and request a return authorization, get your money back and find a better feeder. In my opinion, a warranty that long is silly. Manufacturing defects show up quickly and most are easily fixed with replacement parts when they do happen. What a long warranty does do though, and this is diabolical in my opinion, is that a long warranty lulls people into a sense of security so they either think it is their fault, which seems to be the case with your case, or they wait too long and are past the Amazon return window or even past the Grandpa two year return window. Most people feel bad about returns if they are not done quickly, so a lot of bad feeders get put in a shed.

Other than that, and think about this, you paid about twice the price of an actual ratproof feeder. Why feel bad if they are crazy enough to offer a two year guarantee? Use it....

But, if you aren't ready to do that, I would take the feeder out of the coop for at least two weeks. Now, when you do this, NEVER, EVER, feed the chickens right after you remove the feeder. Wait another two to three hours. Do NOT teach them that their refusal to use the feeder results in your hand feeding them. Chickens have short memories, they do need a couple of weeks though to erase or at least lessen the fear of using the feeder so put the feeder away out of sight.

Next time go cold turkey, put the lid in the operating mode, no training bolts. You might let the hens watch you toss some treats into the feeder but do NOT set the hens on the treadle. Do NOT block the feeder open. Remove the ramp you added. Do keep the sides blocked but I would remove those dangerous side guards to eliminate two major pinch points for safety. Duct tape for sound reduction is good. Make sure the feeder is on a flat solid surface, zero wiggle.

Now the hard part. You have to get the hens hungry. On a well designed, inward swinging door feeder you need one to six hours of no feed. Some hens take right to it in minutes. No wiggle though, rock solid, no rocking around. This means no old deep litter with old feed buried for them to scratch up. No free range, no treats other than what you toss in the lower feed tray, absolutely no giving in either. Let the birds go to bed hungry, you hate to do it but with that huge scary lid that jumps up in their face and goes over their head the hens HAVE to be very hungry in most cases.

When training, put the treadle feeder in the coop the afternoon before so they get used to it. Wait two to three hours after sunrise so the hens are hungry, use your toe to depress the treadle a few times so the hens see where the feed is. Toss in some treats, into the lower feed tray, not the top, under NO circumstances give the hens treats or lay any on the treadle. DO NOT TEACH THE HENS YOU WILL GIVE IN IF THEY WAIT LONG ENOUGH! Sorry for the caps but that is a huge no no.

If you get no takers, go away for an hour. Try again.

If a hen steps up and starts eating, release the toe pressure, let the hen get one or two mouthfuls, then gently use your foot to slowly push her off the treadle. She should try to step up on her own. Under no condition do you set her on the treadle. The most you can do is toss a couple more treats into the lower feed tray and take your toe off the treadle.

Do not spend more than three to four minutes training. If they won't use the feeders, go do something else for an hour. Eventually one hen will learn, she will teach the others, but NO FOOD is to be given outside the lower feed tray, with the hen being forced to use the treadle step in the proper manner. Again, let them go to roost hungry, try the next day.

If on the second day say after lunch and they still refuse to use the feeder, pull it out again and get it out of sight. Wait three to four hours before hand feeding. At all costs you must try to avoid teaching them that being stubborn results in getting hand fed.

All of this can be avoided by buying a well designed treadle feeder. Check the negative reviews first, more than one or two crazy people posting reviews means it might be a chicken feeder but not a good one. Find independent reviews, no affiliate links, no Amazon links, they are supposed to admit they are getting a commission but most don't.

And please, if you chose to follow this advice, follow ALL of it. Don't use logic. Don't think. Just follow the directions, every word. Nothing left out. Nothing added.

I had a customer once, probably the smartest person I've ever met. A doctor, also a lawyer, a research scientist too. Typical email came in, feeder not working. Bad feeder, no biscuit. Orange feeder bad.... So for the next week I emailed with him, even had several long phone calls. Pictures taken and sent.

His first mistake was mounting the feeder up off the ground, expecting the hens to fly up a foot and land on a narrow treadle that would immediately plunge down four inches, slam the door against the feeder with great sound, then the treadle would tilt to one side if the bird wasn't in exactly the right spot on the right side of the treadle. I saw that with the first set of pictures and he fixed that, put it on some patio blocks with plenty of room on front so the hen could walk up, pin the treadle down, stand on one foot and eat. Still he had problems.

Back through the instructions again, after me already telling him to re read the instructions and follow them to the very letter, nothing left out, nothing added.

A week later he called, success! I asked him what he did different and to be honest with me. He was honest, he admitted he wasn't following my instructions. Blocking the lid open, setting the hens on the treadle like you were doing, feeding the hens after a few hours before trying again later.

I was a bit stunned. I asked him why he didn't just follow my instructions?

His reply?

It wasn't logical.

Chickens don't do logic. They follow instinct and learn behavior and he was teaching them the lid and treadle was not supposed to move and that if they were stubborn he would hand feed them a few hours later. He was a brilliant guy, we talked for hours about politics, family, chickens, chicken feeders, and life in general. But he was too smart to follow instructions. Until he did. Problem solved.


People sometimes say their chickens are too stupid to use a treadle feeder. It ain't the chickens sometimes......

 

[Aretha Flapwing]

Thanks for such a comprehensive reply. I've decided to go back to the old feeder (taking it in at night) to let both myself and the bantams calm down for a while. I'll probably return the Grandpa Feeder or sell it as the stress just hasn't been worth it and look for an alternative later in the year.

 

[Al Gerhart]

Good decision, they and you need a break.

But from a manufacturer's viewpoint, let me mention something. I hate it when we get a complaint. Everyone does, but if complaints are not made, if products don't get returned, then we all get lazy and complacent. Our feeder wouldn't be the feeder it is now without the complaints we got over the years.
Returning a product helps the process along as long it is the manufacturers fault, don't deprive them of learning that lesson. If enough people do it their product will become better made, the marketing message will become more honest. Returns suck but they also force us to make better products!

Don't sell the feeder, return it, write an honest review, state exactly why you returned the item in the review, they will learn, other customers will know what they face. Their product will become more honestly marketed and problems will be fixed. You did nothing wrong other than follow their flawed instructions.

If their product becomes better, I will have to improve my feeder to compete, then everyone will be better off. That is capitalism at its best!