Incubator Warehouse sells incubators in all sizes and price ranges for any sort of egg you might want to hatch.  They also offer incubation accessories, after hatch supplies, and hatching eggs as well.  On my first trip through the on-line catalog, I was impressed with the amount of things available, but a little discouraged in my personal search. It’s deep winter here in Western New York, and as much fun as it might be to try to incubate some eggs –this isn’t the time of year to do that.

Then, under the section “After Hatch Supplies”, in “Feeders & Waterers”—I found something –Fodder Seed Blend for feeding farm animal such as chickens….!  Along with the description of the fodder, there was a great photo of bright green grain sprouts. I have been reading about the benefits of feeding sprouted grain fodder to farm animals (see Sarah Cuthill’s article DIY Sprouted Fodder for Livestock), so this seemed to be the perfect way to give it a try.

Photo image from Incubator Warehouse.com

The details on the Incubator Warehouse page gave at least 10 reasons why sprouted fodder is great for farm animals, as well, and they included:

Higher nutrition –barley grain (which sprouts quickly and is used most often in sprouted fodder—either alone or, as in this case, in a mix) has about 12% protein and when it is grown into fodder, it goes up to 15%.   Better digestion which leads to less waste –Grain is digested at around 25% in most animals; with fodder this goes up to nearly 80%.You know exactly what your animal is eating, because you are growing it yourself.You can feed it to all your farm animals.There were more reasons (you can read them for yourself HERE), but I want to add one of my own.  It’s a small thing, but there’s something about having greens growing in your kitchen in the winter—and then feeding them to your animals, that just seems HEALTHY.

The order was in, and in a very few days, on a snowy, blowy morning just before Christmas, the 20 pound box of mixed red wheat, barley and sunflower seed arrived—and was shoved under the bench in the front room until after the holiday stampede.

Finally, I hauled out the box of grain, and read the instructions—which directed me to watch assorted videos on-line, with one of the first by Sarah Cuthill (!).  (You can watch the video HERE.)  I watched the video.  I watched ALL the videos, or at least took a look at them.  I wasn’t interested in feeding an entire herd of cows, or goats, or rabbits, or even replacing all of my chicken feed with sprouted fodder.  I have about two dozen heavy laying hens, and I was hoping that a daily supplement of sprouted grains would help them through the winter while they don’t have access to green grass.  So, as I usually seem to do, I took some basic advice, used my own experiences sprouting seeds for salads and sandwiches, looked through my sheds and came up with a system I hoped would work.

Here’s what I did (and why I did it that way!):

I pulled the three plastic drawers out of a chest I had been keeping-thinking I might raise mealworms. (I might yet.) I found a clear plastic shoe box that fit inside the drawer (and purchased two more shoe boxes at the local Dollar Store for $1 each at the after holiday sale).  I think maybe the main thing to remember when sprouting grains is to keep the grain wet, but to have really good drainage.  The videos I watched showed a rack system with slightly tilted sprouting bins—by watering the top bin, water would drain from one into the bin below and finally into a catch pan.

two bin system

I spaced drainage holes in the bottoms of the three shoe boxes, using the tip of a heat awl.  You could use a metal coat hanger, or something about that  size.  The holes have to allow good drainage, but must be small enough that the grain won’t fall through.  If the sprouting grains don’t drain well, they will mold. I centered the shoe box on a wooden fulcrum inside the larger drawer so the box would tilt to drain.

Drainage holes in bottom of bin

The night before, I had measured out 6 ounces of the grain.  I soaked the grains overnight and when the box was ready, I poured the soaked grains into it.

Measuring the fodder grains

I chose 6 ounces for the first “batch” because I had read that there should be about ½ inch of the soaked grain in the bin, and I wasn’t sure if the grains would plump up at all while soaking. (In the next batches, I used 8 ounces.) I carefully watered the grains, watched to see that they drained, and set them on a shelf in our back office.

When sprouting seeds for salad, I always keep the soaked and drained grains in a dark cabinet until they begin to show green tips, and I wasn’t sure whether to do that with the fodder grains.  Our back office is heated, but not well lighted –not exactly like a dark cabinet, but close enough.  I did not cover the boxes with the fodder grains, but I watered them gently three times a day. Every morning, I dumped the plastic drawer of its accumulated rinse water.

Day 2–if you look closely you will see that the wheat are showing little sprouts

On Day 5, the sprouts were beginning to show green, so I set the bin on the kitchen counter by a window.  I checked for a root system, too.

On Day 6, I rolled back the greened fodder system, and sliced it with a sharp knife.

I only cut off a third of it, because I only planned to use it as a supplement for the hens. The articles I read, and the videos I watched, suggested growing the sprouts up to nine days before feeding them.  I worry about impacted crops in my ladies, so when, at Day 6 the sprouts appeared to be about the size of the lawn grass the chickens like to snip in the summer, I harvested the first third.  For the next two days, I fed a third of the sprouted grain –cut into bite sized pieces –to the hens.

Sprouted fodder, Day 6–by Day 8 the root system is very thick and the sprouts are about 3 to 4 inches tall

In the meantime, every third day, I started another bin full of soaked grains, and now, two weeks later, I am able to feed a third of a bin of the sprouted fodder grains to my laying hens.

The hens love the sprouted fodder. They wait for the dish of pieces to be set in their coop, and then they peck and poke at the green sprouts, the softened grains, and the root mass.

I really have no way to measure the effect on the birds, except to tell you that this week we had several days of very cold weather, and the ladies needed to be kept shut in the coop.  Generally, this would cause a decline in their laying (which they just started getting back up to speed!)—that didn’t happen this time.  Egg production continued as usual.  Was this because of the sprouted fodder supplement?  Again, there’s no way to tell, but I suppose it’s possible.

I can tell you that I intend to continue feeding spouted fodder using grains from Incubator Warehouse. They were just as depicted in the online catalog, which gave me lots of information and links.  I am always looking for a healthy supplement to give my laying hens, and I believe I have found it with this fodder seed blend.