How long can you store feed for?

[BDutch]

Lol Yeah restaurant's aren't an option here either lol. I dont have a stable job it's just some pet sitting for a family member so I get paid in cash and its not frequent enough to set up a bank account. Hopefully I'll have another pet sitting job soon lol. That or our goose starts laying eggs soon.

Buckets sound like it'd make my work easier tbh than fighting bags as well lol

I had relatives who were renovating their house. They used a lot of loam paint. The big paint buckets are great to store chicken feed too.

 

[Sally PB]

I've gotten food grade buckets at a donut/ice cream shop for $1.50 each, lid included.

 

[gtaus]

I had relatives who were renovating their house. They used a lot of loam paint. The big paint buckets are great to store chicken feed too.

That sounds great. Just want to mention that loam paint is a type of non-toxic, natural paint. If you want to reuse buckets that held other paints or materials, I think you have to investigate if the original contents were toxic. If so, don't use those buckets for feed.

They would make excellent buckets for holding tools, etc... I have a few old 5-gallon (toxic) paint buckets that I use to tote my tools and/or use as small garbage cans for the garage.

I've gotten food grade buckets at a donut/ice cream shop for $1.50 each, lid included.

That's a great deal. The bucket lids alone in my town are anywhere from $2 to $3 each. I would certainly be buying up those donut shop food grade buckets with lids. Did you know someone at the shop or did the shop just have them for sale to anyone?

Just wanted to mention that early on, I used big plastic and/or metal garbage cans to store my feed. They work fine, but I only have 10 chickens, so it took a long time to get to the bottom of a large garbage can. You still want to rotate your feed, so you just cannot dump new feed on top of the older feed in the garbage can.

So, I had to have 2 big garbage cans in the garage to hold my feed. That took a lot of room, and when full, I was not moving those garbage cans full of feed anywhere. I later got smarter and put a dolly underneath the garbage cans. That made moving them easy, but they still took up a lot of room in my garage, full or empty.

Here is the Harbor Freight dollies that I purchased, on sale, for less than $10.00 each...

Anyways, the 5-gallon buckets work so much better for me for my long term storage of chicken feed. The buckets, when full, only weight 25# and are easy to carry with the handle. When empty, I take off the lids and can stack them up and out of the way in a corner of the garage. They don't take up much room at all.

The bucket lids are airtight, so they keep the feed fresher, longer, as compared to the garbage cans I formerly used. Because the 5-gallon buckets are smaller, you can rotate the feed faster in one bucket while the other bucket still is held airtight with the lid.

Another big advantage to using 5-gallon buckets is that I have Layer Crumble in some buckets, Layer Pellets in others, Chicken scratch in a few, Cracked Corn in others, etc... If I had to have a larger garbage can for each type of feed I have, I would not have enough room in my garage to park my car. The buckets just stack up one on top of another and take little room.

 

[PhantomSlayer]

That sounds great. Just want to mention that loam paint is a type of non-toxic, natural paint. If you want to reuse buckets that held other paints or materials, I think you have to investigate if the original contents were toxic. If so, don't use those buckets for feed.

They would make excellent buckets for holding tools, etc... I have a few old 5-gallon (toxic) paint buckets that I use to tote my tools and/or use as small garbage cans for the garage.



That's a great deal. The bucket lids alone in my town are anywhere from $2 to $3 each. I would certainly be buying up those donut shop food grade buckets with lids. Did you know someone at the shop or did the shop just have them for sale to anyone?

Just wanted to mention that early on, I used big plastic and/or metal garbage cans to store my feed. They work fine, but I only have 10 chickens, so it took a long time to get to the bottom of a large garbage can. You still want to rotate your feed, so you just cannot dump new feed on top of the older feed in the garbage can.

So, I had to have 2 big garbage cans in the garage to hold my feed. That took a lot of room, and when full, I was not moving those garbage cans full of feed anywhere. I later got smarter and put a dolly underneath the garbage cans. That made moving them easy, but they still took up a lot of room in my garage, full or empty.

Here is the Harbor Freight dollies that I purchased, on sale, for less than $10.00 each...

View attachment 4021779
Anyways, the 5-gallon buckets work so much better for me for my long term storage of chicken feed. The buckets, when full, only weight 25# and are easy to carry with the handle. When empty, I take off the lids and can stack them up and out of the way in a corner of the garage. They don't take up much room at all.

The bucket lids are airtight, so they keep the feed fresher, longer, as compared to the garbage cans I formerly used. Because the 5-gallon buckets are smaller, you can rotate the feed faster in one bucket while the other bucket still is held airtight with the lid.

Another big advantage to using 5-gallon buckets is that I have Layer Crumble in some buckets, Layer Pellets in others, Chicken scratch in a few, Cracked Corn in others, etc... If I had to have a larger garbage can for each type of feed I have, I would not have enough room in my garage to park my car. The buckets just stack up one on top of another and take little room.

I like the thought of that keeping them separated. We used to mix the crumble/pellet, corn and sunflower seeds together in one big bin but I found our girls would try to be picky and only go for the good stuff. So being able to withhold certain parts of them is much easier. I feed using red coffee can containers so I just fill them where the feed is and go. Cause I measure feed twice a day.

 

[gtaus]

I like the thought of that keeping them separated. We used to mix the crumble/pellet, corn and sunflower seeds together in one big bin but I found our girls would try to be picky and only go for the good stuff.

Yes, I am careful not to give very much in terms of treats to the chickens. Having a separate container of those treats makes that possible.

So being able to withhold certain parts of them is much easier.

I suspect all our chickens would eat the treats first, given the chance. What kid doesn't want to fill up on dessert before eating the vegetables?

I feed using red coffee can containers so I just fill them where the feed is and go. Cause I measure feed twice a day.

I don't drink coffee, so I don't have a stash of coffee cans that I could use for feed storage. But I imagine just about any large food container with a closeable top would work. Speaking of which, we bought some Carmel corn and snacks in large plastic jars with screw on lids this Christmas season...

I don't know the exact capacity of those large plastic jars but just eyeballing them I would say maybe 2+ gallons each. I save the empty jars for Dear Wife's wild bird feed. She had a squirrel get into her bag of bird food last summer. I think the plastic jar might be enough to encourage the squirrel to look elsewhere. If not, I guess I'll be looking for tins, or maybe a large glass jar like you get with bulk pickles.

If you are tight on money, maybe look at buying some of your people food in large containers like those and just repurpose them for storing chicken feed after they are empty. You will probably save money buying people food in bulk and have a nice reusable container when the food is all gone.

 

[MichaelDJ]

I like the thought of that keeping them separated. We used to mix the crumble/pellet, corn and sunflower seeds together in one big bin but I found our girls would try to be picky and only go for the good stuff. So being able to withhold certain parts of them is much easier. I feed using red coffee can containers so I just fill them where the feed is and go. Cause I measure feed twice a day.

I ferment my homemade whole grains. The stuff they normally are picky about they eat when it's fermented. Before I feed the next day I wait until any leftovers are gone, usually a small handful of the less than desirable grains.

 

[Sally PB]

That's a great deal. The bucket lids alone in my town are anywhere from $2 to $3 each. I would certainly be buying up those donut shop food grade buckets with lids. Did you know someone at the shop or did the shop just have them for sale to anyone?

My neighbor told me about this place. The owner sold the buckets to anyone who asked, as many as they wanted, until the buckets were gone. If no one wanted them, the owner recycled them.

I think word might have gotten around... the first two times, I bought 3 or 4. After that, they only had 1 or 2, and a few times they were out.

I did notice that they've held up very well outside. They haven't gotten brittle with the UV light from summer.

 

[gtaus]

If no one wanted them [5-gallon buckets with lids], the owner recycled them.

It's great that you were able to buy some buckets from them.

Too bad that the owner ends up recycling any of their buckets. It's just (sadly) amazing at how much stuff we toss into the garbage/recycling when those items could be reused or repurposed for a second life, like storing chicken feed long term.

 

[Sally PB]

Too bad that the owner ends up recycling any of their buckets.

If enough people found out... they probably sell them all.

 

[RennaeHanson]

How would you know if the food was “old”?

Old feed will smell musty, and maybe a bit sour depending on what is in your feed. It also may clump and be a bit sticky, again it depends on what you feed.