Growing Your Own Fodder
Would you like to feed your animals super nutritious food that is full of live enzymes, that will help them produce better and healthier milk/eggs/meat, etc? And...save money in the process? Here's how!
First, start soaking your grains (most say about 8 hrs, but I generally soak mine overnight). I use wheat berries, as they are the easiest to sprout. I've had bad luck trying to sprout whole oats, barley, as it all got moldy.
Once you've soaked your grains, put them in a colander and rinse with cool water.
Next, transfer them into sprouting trays, and place them in the area you plan to grow them.
I bought three miniature green houses from TSC (Tractors Supply Co.) on sale. They have 4 shelves, I can fit 8 trays in each green house. The trays are plastic trays my brother bought from a greenhouse supply store, very lightweight with holes in the bottom.
You want to keep your seeds moist. If there is water standing in their tray, it is too wet, and it will encourage mold to grow.
I take a water hose and water mine 2-3 times daily. Or, if you have yours inside, you could use a spray bottle to spritz them with.
By the 2nd day you should start to notice little curly white tails on them.
The fodder will be at its optimal nutrition at day 7 (1 week). That is when it will be the most nutritious, but sometimes I let mine grow to about day 10 or so. Just what ever suits your fancy.
When you get ready to feed your fodder, just dump the tray upside down, and the fodder should come out without a glitch. I like to chop mine up, into small squares and toss them into the different pens.
It may take a couple of days for your animals to take to it, but once they do, they'll love it!
Last winter I fed fodder to all the animals for breakfast and fermented feed/grains for supper (blog post coming up on that soon).
Fodder is an easy, nutritious way to supplement greens in the cold winter months when all other plant life is pretty much non-existent.
Approx. every 1 lb of dry seed will yield about 5-6 lbs of fodder.
Have you grown fodder before? What was your experience? Leave a comment and let me know.
Blessings -
~ Aspen
Great post this is something that I have to give it a try, it seems so economically $$ healthy :)
ReplyDeleteBlessings
~Laura~
Hi Laura,
ReplyDeleteWhen you live on a homestead you are always looking for ways to save money, feed nutrient-dense foods, and take the best care of your animals as possible, and I believe growing and feeding fodder can do all three of those. My eggs are so dark orange and yummy when my birds have been eating it, the rabbits love it, and in the future I'd like to grow enough to supplement our milk cow's diet with it, but for now growing it for the birds is all I can handle.
~ Aspen
Thanks for sharing.
ReplyDeleteCurtis Hale
Marble Falls, TX
Enjoyed this post, and will tell my friend that has back yard chicken pets about this.
ReplyDeleteCan you grow foddler outside? Texas is hot and many articles say to grow foddler between 60 and 75 degrees. Texas is much hotter.
ReplyDeleteYes. I grow mine on the back porch. It grows much better and is more nutritious when grown out in the sunshine.
DeleteBlessings -
~ Aspen