The Problem Index → Stock
My chickens cost more than buying eggs
They probably do, and that's worth saying plainly. Keep chickens for the eggs you can't buy, the scraps they eat and the manure — then cut the feed bill with the two things that genuinely work.
What actually works
◆ Proven
The chicken tractor
Fresh ground daily. Supplemental feed drops meaningfully on good pasture — not to zero, whatever anybody tells you.
$80–300◇ Plausible
The black soldier fly composter
Larvae at ~40% protein that harvest themselves up a ramp into a bucket. Seasonal in the north — they stop below about 60°F.
$40–150✕ Avoid
Sprouted fodder as a feed-cost strategy
Sold hard as the answer to exactly this. The weight gain is water: USDA found a 17% dry matter LOSS and 21% energy loss.
$500–3,000 for a system that loses you nutritionRun the numbers
- Flock feed & egg math → — free calculator, works offline.
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