The birds have migrated to another welfare state and I am amazed at just how much feed they consumed. Initially, your poultry needs to become used to the feeder and this is very simple, requiring only the positioning of two bolts (provided). That’s great for us as we have a busy farm [the chickens are just our pets by the way we aren’t a commercial homestead or small holding. Not one of them has been hurt, not even when they use it to do acrobatics (yes, the hen inside the grain tray survived! So with the money I was wasting on feed I’d worked out it would mean the grandpa chicken feeder actually pay for itself!

As for the OP's question, about the only way to ant proof anything is to borrow a trick that was used back in the day; adding some sort of moat with oil. I have a small flock of 7 hens in a backyard setup, and wanted something that did three things: 1) protect the food from the rain, 2) protect the food from other critters, and 3) allow my flock to have better access to more food more often without me needing to refill. We haven't had them poo on any other part of the feeder, but I suppose they might perch on the roof of the hopper. There is a training period that allows the birds to become accustomed to the operation of the feeder that requires no effort on the part of the chicken-keeper.

I just keep my feed in a trough inside the Omlet run which is shut at night so only little beasties can get at it. This video is the first impressions video – I’ll add another post and video after a few weeks, when it’s a bit more lived in and our Marsh Daisies have had their wicked way with it. So, between the risk of disease posed to my flock and the destruction/consumption of feed, I began to realize that a well constructed feeder that keeps nasty beasties out of the chicken feed and chicken coop/run is worth its weight in gold. I knew rats will urinate where they eat and that urine causes Leptospirosis in humans but didn’t know anything further than that.

A standard chicken feeder will feed 6 chickens for 10 days and a large chicken feeder will feed 12 chickens for 10 days. Perhaps the most important part of an “automatic feeder” is to have food available whenever the chickens want to eat.F eeding chickens is a straight forward task and there are of course a number of different feeders available for the poultry keeper, whatever the flock size. The part that shoves the door open has a fatal flaw as well, it is thin for its purpose and quite flimsy. A properly designed feeder door swings in, not up, and uses a fraction of the pinch points, parts, and fasteners. Ever since we built the coop and outdoor run 10 years ago, we’ve had trouble with rats and wild birds eating the chicken food. This is very straightforward and simply involves placing bolts through the treadle plate arms to attach it to the feeder.

At least a half dozen mice and several big rats were racing around the feeder stuffing themselves, leaving, then coming back for more.I placed a camera in the coop to see what was going on during the night and sure enough it was the rats eating the feed. I also saw and like it was galvanized, perfect, it should last decades not months like some of our plastic/PVC feeders. It takes a week or so to train the chickens but once they learn, they take to it like it's all they ever had.

I'm sure that the investment in this feeder is going to pay off over time with all the feed I'm not going to be throwing away anymore. The Standard size is suitable for all chickens, pheasants and is designed for smaller flocks of up to 12 chickens. It’s agonizing for chickens and they find it hard to walk and left untreated they can succumb to death.

Chickens are copy cats if they see another chicken doing something and there is food involved, they are straight onto it! We provide videos on how best to introduce your chickens to their new favorite feeder with step-by-step tips on teaching them to use it successfully.