sadietoo Posted January 22, 2012 Share Posted January 22, 2012 I am (was) the proud owner of three sets of glug and grubs...but whilst Pansy was poorly she couldn't get her head into the grubs and so I started feeding the girls from a large aluminium pan on the ground..they all loved it and I don't think I had so much waste. There are obviously disadvantages to this in that the food (I feed dry mash) does get spilt on the floor a bit (but they also pull it out of the grub), but I have to say that whilst I like the glugs I'm really not so keen on the grub. It seems to go manky inside and out very quickly (I have all three sets in the dishwasher at the moment because even after a scrub with very hot soapy water they still feel sort of slimy ) and it is particularly difficult to clean inside the mouldings where it hooks on to the cage...so I'm thinking of just feeding from pans on the floor and dispensing with the grubs altogether (I should say that my run is covered so the food shouldn't get wet as long as I remember to put it far enough back and in the middle). Do you have any better feeding bowls that you would recommend? Thanks for readingx Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alet_chicken Posted January 22, 2012 Share Posted January 22, 2012 I eventually gave up on my grubs because it was impossible to clean inside the hook mouldings. Have sold all my grubs on ebay except for two ancient ones, from the days when they still had metal hooks. The main concern with open feeders is that chickens have no idea of basic hygiene, so if your chickens can get into the pan then you will have to contend with dirty feet (or worse) in the food. And if they can perch on the side then there is a risk that it will tip over (this would depend on its shape/weight though). Fortunately there are many different types of standing feeders available. I have one of these, which is great for putting on the ground because it has legs (and a rain hat). It is also worth looking at these feeders (I have the 6kg feeder), which are good if you can hang them up. Hope this helps! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sadietoo Posted January 22, 2012 Author Share Posted January 22, 2012 alet_chicken, thank you so much that does indeed help a lot...I absolutely take your point about chickens walking through their food and worse.... I think I will try the one with legs first as we only have the omlet run with the cube and I'm not sure about suspending the other one from it. I have a slightly modified (but not completely finished ) cube run at the moment which is still a stoop in run rather than the easily accessible WIR which I think I put on my wish list and passed to OH and which he assured me I would have by the time his modifications are finished..(don't ask!) and I think anything hanging from it is likely to make life quite difficult. To be fair the grubs did come up quite well in the dishwasher, but I still think they harbour mouldy food in those hooks and are difficult to empty out completely when you refill them because of their shape. Ok list for Chicken shop is getting longer........ (rubs hands together in anticipation!) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Olly Posted January 22, 2012 Share Posted January 22, 2012 I do agree about the moulding in the Grubs, and my hens used to manage to get woodchip/aubiose inside it. I gave up on mine when I got the WIR and they wouldn't hang from the weldmesh, and bought a plastic feeder like the second link shown above, which works very well. I stood it on a bit of wood to begin with, but they kept kicking it over so now it's suspended from the roof of the run - hey presto, hardly any spillage, and NO bits of woodchip in the food! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LunaKiw1 Posted January 22, 2012 Share Posted January 22, 2012 Our original two used the Grub and pellets no problem but their three replacements were used to layers mash and so we abandoned the Gru and bought one of the type 2 hanging feeders. We have an Omlet WIR which has a handy hook in thr centre of the roof and we suspend the feeder from it via an old (horse's) lead rope. Keeping it just a few inches off the ground seems to make it easy for the gilrls to feed but trickier for them to flick food out so we don't get much waste. We take it in each night and any of the 'dust' that is left is mixed to become their porridge for breakfast next morning (served, I confess, in a nice 'checken design' bowl from M&S!) That way every single bit of mash gets consumed during the course of a day. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Duncan08 Posted January 23, 2012 Share Posted January 23, 2012 I too am a fan of the hanging feeders, the girls pull the food out of the grubs, the Go feeder is better, for cleaning but the lid is a bit fiddly. The hanging feeder has very little waste, very little contamination and is definitely my favourite. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
