How to prevent fines from getting into your feeder

[Blue Ridge Billy]

I stumbled on to this idea because of a problem that I had with a bag of pellets. I bought a bag of pellets recently that was about 20 percent fines. I am not kidding. I just imagined that the feed mill was cleaning out the lines when this bag was filled. I have never seen so much dust in rabbit feed before. To solve the problem, I found a piece of hardware cloth wire that was about 4 foot wide and I rolled it up to make it a tube about 8" in diameter. I set a 5 gal pail on the ground and dropped one end of the tube into the pail and the other end of the tube I held at about a 45 degree angle above the pail. I poured all the contents of the bag down the inclined tube one scoop at a time. All of the fines dropped through the hardware cloth tube onto the ground. All of the clean pellets went into the 5 gal pail. I kept doing this until I had cleaned the entire bag of pellets. If you do this, make sure you get a very fine mesh hardware cloth with about 1/8 to 1/4 inch mesh. You would not believe the pile of dust that was left on the ground below the tube. I am planning on doing this for every bag of pellets that I buy because they all have too many fines as far as I am concerned. I use fineX feeders and using both the fineX feeders and cleaning each bag of feed I have almost totally eliminated fines. I know that if you have a large operation this would not be practical but I just have a small barn with about 22 rabbits. I hope this idea helps you keep your stock a little healthier by removing dust.

 

[MaggieJ]

Glad you found a way to get rid of the fines, Billy, but I think I would be looking for a better quality feed... It would likely be cheaper in the long run. Another way to prevent waste would be to use the fines along with some whole wheat flour and other ingredients like sunflower seeds, flax seeds etc. to make a bunny biscuit. I know there is a thread about this somewhere... I'll see if I can find it.

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Okay, here's one thread about biscuits.

post3315.html?hilit=biscuits#p3315

You could just use the fines along with the ground wheat or whole wheat flour. Apple juice would work well as a binder and you can add anything that is good for rabbits for the treat portion.

 

[akane]

I could use those fines for a lot of stuff. I just used the fines from my bird pellets to make apricot juice pellet slurry with mixed vegetables for my breeding pair. Nothing goes to waste.

 

[Blue Ridge Billy]

I appreciate the feedback but I don't have time to make bunnie biscuits and apricot slurry. I am going to feed these guys all the rabbit pellets and Alfalfa hay that they want to eat every day along with clean water until it is time to knock them in the head and eat them.

 

[MaggieJ]

Personally, I'd rather take the few minutes to mix up a bowl of dough than waste 20% of the feed... but it's not everyone's cup of tea, doing extras for their meat rabbits. And that's okay!

 

[akane]

Takes less time to dissolve leftovers in to something edible than it does to run to the store for another bag to make up the lost 20lbs and it doesn't cost gas money.

 

[Frosted Rabbits]

Takes less time to dissolve leftovers in to something edible than it does to run to the store for another bag to make up the lost 20lbs and it doesn't cost gas money.

And raising your own food is supposed to be partly, economically driven-- If anything, collected fines can go into a compost pile, let the wroms turn them into more garden gold...

 

[Fid]

+1 on notifying your feed dealer. That's money down the drain.

 

[Secuono]

The bag can be filled with fines if they just throw the bags onto the truck, then shelf, then your car and then tossed into where ever you keep the feed.
You can mix the fines w/some water and feed it to chickens, if you have them.
I also don't see the point in separating the fines from the normal feed, is it because you don't want to flip the food bowl to clean it out? They do make feeders with mesh on the bottom so it separates all on it's own. I wouldn't bother taking out the fines, to me that's more of a waste of time than adding water and re-feeding it.

 

[Jessykah]

Thanks for this great idea! I have some j-feeders with mesh on the bottom and it sifts out the fines great! But then the feeder under that one gets covered in fines, then the feeder under that one as well. And I have several feeders with no holes on the bottom, and they are almost permanantly attached to the cages so that it's difficult to scoop out the fines. I dump my pellets into a bin, so the fines from the bottom of the bag are now on top, then when you get down to the bottom of the bin, it is all fines. So if I sift them out over the wheel barrow, then I can add some water to the fines and feed to my pigs. They will love it, and it should help the piglets grow faster! Thanks again all for the tips.