Old Fashioned Chicken Feed Recipes

Domestic chickens have been kept in poultry houses and fenced yards since the 1700’s. Penned hens who cannot free range for themselves must be fed. We’ll share historical photos and old fashioned chicken feed recipes to show you exactly how farmers have been mixing seeds and grains for their flocks for over 300 years:

antique European artwork oil on canvas of a brown rooster perched on an old wooden wheelbarrow with a brown, white, black and yellow hen, with 7 chicks surrounding the yellow hen, free ranging in a meadow pasture in front of an old white stone farmhouse with thatched roof

Old Fashioned Chicken Feed Recipes

If you are wanting to feed your hens in a more natural way, using knowledge our ancestors had, the following excerpts from antique books should prove useful and exciting when it comes to crafting your own chicken feed recipes!

an old black and white engraving style drawing of a church-like poultry house with peaked gables and ornate gothic architecture with a woman and child feeding chickens in a fenced yard in front of the coop — An illustration of a Gothic style poultry house and fenced chicken yard from an 1896 publication.

Notes on Using Antique Recipes:

Some of the old recipes do not have specific directions nor mixing ratios given. This is for a few reasons:

1.) It was assumed the flock would be given all the green waste, weeds, clippings, spoiled fruit + discard from the farm’s garden and scraps from the farmhouse kitchen, which would allow the hens to balance their own diets. (This actually does work!)

2.) Some feed mixes would be used more like how we use scratch grains today, as a way to feed loud, hungry hens first thing in the morning. Once the majority of the day’s eggs had been laid, the chicken yard gate would be opened and the hens turned out to free range for the afternoon. Or, if the chickens needed to stay penned and out of un-fenced crop land, a bowl of that day’s feed would be given and clippings + scraps added to the chicken yard as they were generated throughout the day.

Crafting Balanced Blends

If your flock has some access to pasture ranging and gets regular garden weeds and kitchen scraps, you may find these feed mixes to be economical and lovely! If you’d like to guarantee your birds are going to get the vitamins, minerals and nutrients they need, I use Fertrell’s Poultry Show & Breeder Supplement, which is made of powdered natural ingredients that you add to grain mixes. Fertrell’s Poultry Nutribalancer is a balanced vitamin & mineral mix that is actually used by some of the natural feed companies in their whole grain mixes, such as Mile Four.

Whole Grain Chicken Feeding Advice from the Past

The following excerpts were taken from a book published in 1920 titled Everybody’s Standard Poultry Feed Book. Source: archive.org

Save this chart! It is a handy reference for the protein percent contained in each grain.

Old Fashioned Chicken Feed Recipes — Grain Mills used to offer their own feed mixes. Here the exact measurements for the most popular blends are described with their corresponding protein percents.

Individual Grains Used In Chicken Feed Recipes

Here are excerpts from 100+ year-old books on poultry feeding, when each keeper was responsible for mixing their own grain-based feeds:

The following excerpts were taken from a book published in 1920 titled Everybody’s Standard Poultry Feed Book. Source: archive.org

I have experimented with feeding rye in a mix and like others, I have found it makes chicken poops VERY sticky and eggs are almost never laid clean.

Seeds & Legumes Used In Chicken Feed Recipes

Sprouted Oats

Everybody’s Standard Poultry Feed Book (1920) suggested that all hens should be given sprouted oats. Use whole oats (not steamed or rolled) that are sold in large 50 pound bags. They may be called “feed oats”, “oat seed” or “oat groats”. All of these are the whole oat which can be sprouted using a sprouting kit. (Afflinks) The book author tested sprouted oats when the sprouts were 1.5 inches long and obtained the following nutritional analysis:

black & white image of sprouted oats in a homemade sprouting tray of wood and fine mesh screen — A very early photograph included in the 1920 book showing how sprouted oats can be prepared and fed to hens. We can achieve similar results from modern sprouting tray kits.

whole oat grain on a white background — How whole oats look, straight from the feed store bag. These CAN be sprouted!

Mixed Grain Chicken Feed Recipes

Here are some of the old fashioned chicken feed recipes I found in antique books:

An excerpt from How to Raise Poultry for Profit written by the National Poultry Institute, Washington D.C. printed in 1920. Image source: archive.org

The above publication also gave this feeding advice: “Feed the grain mixture {grain ration, shown above} in a straw litter in the morning and evening. Scatter as much feed in the litter in the morning as the hens will eat up clean in half an hour. In the evening increase this amount so that the fowls will have full crops to meet the body requirements during the night. Thirteen hens of the American and English breeds (dual-purpose breeds) will consume about one quart of scratch feed a day, while the same amount of feed will usually prove sufficient for 16 hens of the smaller breeds such as the Leghorns. The day mash {book spelling error, should read “dry” as in dry mash ration, shown above} should be fed in an open hopper to which the fowls will have constant access. In addition feed such green feed as sprouted oats, or mangel beets, cabbage, or kale to the fowls at noon. Provide a supply of grit, charcoal, and oyster shell in an open box or hopper, and be sure to see that the birds have a constant supply of drinking water. In cold weather it pays to take the chill off the water.”

Chicken Feed Recipes

Whether new or old, here is a collection of chicken feed rations & recipe blends I have found in published books: (source for all images: archive.org)

From the 1922 Poultry Feeding Secrets book:

Note that “shorts” referenced below are “wheat shorts“, which are sometimes called “wheat middlings”.

An excerpt from Day Range Poultry with recipes for making a ton of chicken feed at a time. Fertrell still sells the products listed!

feed types fed to chickens in January 1944 oats, wheat, corn, home mixed mash shown as percentages

a drawing of a girl sprinkling grain from a basket for chickens, turkeys and other poultry who are all running towards her.

Sourcing Ingredients for Chicken Feed Recipes

While you will be able to get most of the whole or cracked grains from your local feed store, here are some links that may help if you’re crafting your own blend: (some Amazon affiliate links)

Organic Fish Meal (Fertrell’s)

Non-GMO Cracked Corn (50 lb bag)

Fertrell’s Poultry Nutribalancer

Fertrell’s Poultry Show and Breeder Supplement

Organic Split Yellow Peas & Whole Peas

Practical Chicken Feed Recipes & Regimens for Today

We may live in more suburban areas than our rural ancestors but chickens have not yet lost their incredible instincts when it comes to feeding themselves! You may find the easiest balance is to purchase organic all-grain feed mixes that you then supplement with pasture ranging, garden clippings, and kitchen scraps. Scratch & Peck, Mile Four, Homestead Harvest, and New Country Organics are just a few of the brands available.

If you have a flock of less than 12 hens who get daily fenced yard access to range for some of their own bugs, you will not need to feed as much as those who keep their hens permanently penned. If your family regularly eats fruits and vegetables, you are likely producing enough kitchen scrap to help supplement the diet of at least 2 hens per family member. If you grow a backyard garden 100 square feet or larger, garden weeds, clipped leaves, ruined fruit and caterpillar pests will also richly contribute to your hen’s diet.

a rooster and 8 hens standing among flowering perennials, eating a whole grain feed mix from the dirt at their feet

Enjoy!

I hope this article has been useful for giving you the nutritional information and confidence that you CAN craft your own chicken feed recipes! If you feel hesitant, track your flock’s egg output for a week or two. Then run an experiment to see how your flock’s laying on the new feed blend compares. You may be pleasantly surprised!

You Might Also Enjoy Reading:

Nest Box Herb Recipes (make colorful nesting herb mixes!)

Great Depression Chicken Keeping

How to Feed Chickens When Local Stores are Empty

How to Get PINK Eggs (& what hens lay them!)

Old Fashioned Chicken Feed Recipes