We now have our own wheat to feed the chickens and last week we started to slowly introduce the wheat into the chickens diet. I hope to make the wheat at least 50% of their diet. We are very gradually introducing it into their diet. The whole process may take a couple of months. This is done to avoid any stress to the chickens. We are working with the feed mill to adjust the rations that they send us. Last Friday I sent a sample of the wheat to a lab to have it feed value analyzed. We still need to feed more protein, flax seed, salt, calcium and other micro nutrients and so the feed mill will make this for us to feed alongside the wheat.
I have withdrawn the eggs from organic certification as the wheat is only 1st year transitional. It was organically grown but the field needs to be free of chemicals for three years before any crop can be organic.
Not enough US farmers are converting to organic farming to provide all the organic feed needed so some of it is being imported from China. I choose to believe that the organic certification is legit and I do believe in the international organic certification. I have the problem that how could i say my eggs were local when up to 65% of the feed we were giving them was from China. We're talking a big carbon footprint. So now we will be using wheat from the field next door. To see a video of the wheat being harvested go to www.eatwell.com and follow the youtube links... Nigel