personal experiences with Modesto Milling organic?

[JessiL]

Hello, everyone.

We are considering making the big plunge to full organic on the farm. Our duck egg vendors have expressed an interest in selling organic-fed duck eggs (and are willing to increase the price they pay us per egg to match), and since we'd get a much better price buying direct from the mill in bulk, we are thinking about just switching everybody over to organic.

So for those of you who have fed or are currently feeding the organic pellets from Modesto Milling (a California-based company), what are your thoughts regarding your rabbits' performance on it? We raise heritage meat breeds here (American and Champagnes, hopefully Creme d'Argents too soon) and heavily value large litters and fast growth.

Thanks!

 

[PSFAngoras]

I feed it and love it.

I did just have a scare with mold poisoning, but was able to trace it back to personal error, not feed supply. All of the 15 other rabbits are eating out of the same supply and are fine.

It's a 17% protein pellet, so I'd watch any rabbits you have that have a tendancy to pack on the weight. Unfortunately, I overfed my champs, and the older doe was having breeding problems for a while, but it looks like she may be over most of that now. Again, personal error for having rationed sooner.

The grow out rates on the kits is phenomenal though, I get my champ kits and champ cross kits to about 4.5-5 pounds in 8-9 weeks, so I'm very pleased with it. The angora's coats are none the worse for wear with a lower protein than they're used to, and I think overall everyone eats less because it's quality ingredients and not filled with junk.

The only downside I find also has an upside to it too. The pellets are softer than other feeds. This is great for the kits since they usually slobber up the end of a harder pellet, and drop the rest in the drop pan and it's never seen again since it then gets peed on. They seem to be able to chew the softer pellets better, so there's less waste for me at weaning. That also means the pellets don't survive shipping as well as other brands, so there's a lot of fines in the bag to clog up feeders and it's wasted that way. I've built a little pellet sifter that I run the pellets through before they go in my pellet tub, and it works wonders. There's usually about 1-2# of fines per bag, but since it's high in nitrogen I dump it in the compost, so it's not technically a waste. I did try to Mix it with honey and herbs to feed back as a treat, but the buns weren't fond of it.

I feed my chickens Modesto too, and they love it.

 

[JessiL]

Thanks, PSF!

Do you have a local source for your Modesto products that you can buy from regularly, or do you get it in bulk and store it? Even though we are that much closer to the mill than you are, none of our local feed stores normally carry it. So if we want to pay a reasonable price, we'll have to order direct and have an entire pallet shipped over. It's really quite reasonable in price, but even with our many chickens, ducks, geese, and rabbits to share the various feedstuffs, we'll probably have enough feed to cover us for 3-4 months. I'm a bit worried about storing milled feed for that long.

 

[PSFAngoras]

Unfortunately, the only source that's 'close' to me is a homesteading store an hour drive away., one way. The next closest store is a two and a half hour drive. The homesteading store does keep it in stock regularly though, so it's not all bad, and since we buy our dog food at Costco and that's the town we got to for Costco, we have to go up there anyway. I just stock up for two weeks worth so I don't have to make the trip too often.

Our local feed store won't bring it in, since they already carry Ranch Way's organic feed. I do like that ranch way is more local, but it still has soy, so no dice for me.

I haven't looked into buying a pallet, but considering I go through 50# a week with the rabbits, that I buy it for the chickens too, and that my MIL feeds the same to her rabbits and is looking into getting chickens, I really should do the math to price it out. If it comes closer to $20 a bag vs. the $35 I'm paying now, my mom might even jump in on it, meaning we'd be able to buy just enough for everyone to use it before it goes bad thanks to all of her chickens, ducks, and turkeys. I suppose even I she won't, I could probably get enough people together to share a pallet. I just have t had the time to do much research lately.