This article is part of our guide to the Revolutionary Chicken no-waste chicken feeder port. If you’re comparing feeder port designs and want to see what other features Revolutionary Chicken feeder ports offer besides reducing chicken feed waste, click here.
The thing that bothered me the most about raising chickens was seeing how much food was wasted. Sure, the chickens would peck around the spilled food in the dirt, but most of the food that landed in the dirt stayed in the dirt. Apparently, they didn’t care that their chicken feed wasn’t dirt cheap. In fact, it was quite expensive! This bothered me so much that I spent five years coming up with a feeder port with the goal of reducing waste. In this post, I share the results I got when testing it against other feeder ports.
Why Most Chicken Feeder Ports Spill So Much Feed
Problem #1 – Small Ports Keep Feed Too Close to the Opening
Most generic feeder ports these days are small and screw into a hole in the side of a bucket.
One problem with these ports is that they waste a lot of chicken feed. The feed is very close to the opening of the port. Chickens are messy eaters, and the feed just spills out. Whenever you see the feeders with the small feeder ports like these, you will also see a mess underneath.
Problem #2 – Nothing Prevents Feed from Spilling Out
As chickens eat from ports, they pull feed up from the opening, and a lot of it goes on the space between the opening and the end of the port. As chickens heads go in and out, the feed on this space tumbles out onto the ground.
Two Design Fixes That Dramatically Reduce chicken Feed Waste
Fix #1 –Move the Feed Farther from the Opening
The Revolutionary Chicken feeder ports reduce chicken feed waste because feed is farther away from where the chickens stick their heads in. The chickens need to reach a bit to get their food, so it is physically harder for them to waste feed.
Fix #2 –Add an Interior Spill-Prevention Lip
My second fix to reduce chicken feed waste is that I added a lip on the inside edge of the feeder port. It acts in concert with the deeper port design. The chickens often bring up more feed than they can eat, and so some of it goes on the space between the opening and the end of the feeder. This small barrier allows the feed to stay in this space, so they eat from here as well as the deeper opening.
The lip is beveled and curved with the chickens comfort in mind, so they won’t need to lean over any sharp edges to eat.
The same design also helps prevent mice infestations by reducing waste (see how to keep mice out of your chicken coop here).
Real Feed Waste Test Results (12X and 13X Less Waste)
To find out how effective the Revolutionary Feeder ports were at reducing chicken feed waste, I set up a simple experiment. First, I made two feeders: one with two Revolutionary Chicken feeder ports, and one with two generic small feeder ports. Because I wanted to catch the food that they spilled, I laid out a tarp on the ground in the run, and then put a large collecting tray on top of the tarp. I put a folded wire cage and set it on top of the collecting tray. This cage served to keep chickens from eating any feed that spilled. Then I put a few bricks on the cage so the feeder would be at a good height, and set the feeders on the bricks.
My chickens ate from the feeder with the generic feeder ports for three days, and then they ate from the feeder with the Revolutionary Chicken feeder ports for three days. I offered them no treats during the testing period.
SO…do the Revolutionary Chicken feeder ports reduce chicken feed waste? In tests with two different generic small ports, the Revolutionary Chicken feeder port wasted 12X less and 13X less. See feeder port waste test video.
I used a mash-type feed. I did the same test with crumbles, and the Revolutionary Chicken feeder ports wasted 10 X less.
Test conditions:
- mash feed
- 72 hour test period/ea
- same feeder height
- no treats
One-Day Side-by-Side Comparison
This is what the chicken feed waste I collected looked like after one day.
I’m not making this up—anyone can do the test and see for themselves. It’s not even close.
DIY Option or Ready-Made Solution
If you want to reduce chicken feed waste, you have two options:
- Install the Revolutionary Chicken feeder ports in your own container (DIY)–Square containers work best
- Use the full Waste-Proof, Rain-Proof, Mouse-Proof Chicken Feeder
Both are backed by a full refund guarantee.