One of my largest frustrations in starting our farming enterprise has been that of figuring out what equipment works and doesn’t work.
The wrong selection ends up costing you time, mental health and most importantly money.
And trust me, I’ve made my fair share of poor choices.
Anytime you can learn from someone who “has been there and done that”, make it your business to do so! It will save you a lot of heartache in the end, and is quite frankly the reason this website even exists.
In an attempt to save money, I have re-purposed, salvaged and built all kinds of equipment for the farm; and yes there are some designs out there to build poultry feeders using PVC that work pretty well. My experience with them was that they allowed the birds to waste a lot of feed.
With that in mind, this is one area where spending some money makes a lot of sense to me. The grain you are setting out each day costs way more money than a good functioning feeder that keeps the feed off of the ground, and where it belongs: in front of the birds so they can eat it and fatten up!
Such is the case with the Brower Equipment Reel Feeder for pastured poultry operations. This is a piece of equipment that doesn’t really care if you are a homesteader or commercial producer, it will serve you well and is worth the cost.
These feeders are molded, heavy duty plastic and work great for chickens on pasture aged 3 weeks up to maturity. We also double purpose them and raise our Thanksgiving turkeys with them as well. They don’t tip, they hold an enormous amount of grain and will take a beating. Holding enough grain is something that is often overlooked when raising fast growing meat birds. These birds are high octane sports cars, and if you don’t have adequate fuel in front of them they can stress out and really hurt your performance in a hurry. And, the design really keeps the feed in the feeder and not on the ground so long as you don’t overfill them. That simply is not the case with homemade PVC feeders that I have seen.
As your birds grow, you also need lots of linear footage so that a good percentage of them can belly up to the bar at once. The Brower feeders are 4′ or 5′ long respectively.
In our 120 square foot tractors, one feeder will suffice for the first week to ten days on pasture and a second one can be added after that thru maturity. These are well built and when I say they can take a beating, I mean it. I have run over these with my 1/2 ton truck and had ice build up bust holes into them. The darn things are so thick that you can literally just bolt or screw scab pieces of lumber or plastic onto them and repair them. We have some really ugly looking Brower feeders here, but they are still doing there job and some of them are going into their 10th year of use!
So is there any downside to this equipment?
Nothing is perfect and these feeders have two negatives, one of which is easily remedied but creates an additional problem. The one physical flaw is how the handle is attached to the feeder itself. A single, not terribly long, really small screw is provided to thread into the PVC cap on each end of the PVC handle to attach it to uprights on the feeder. In practice, it’s good because it allows the “reel” feeder to do it’s job. The handle will spin freely if a chicken attempts to roost on the handle (and they will), throwing them off so they can’t drop manure into the feed. However, after a season or two of use and being moved each day out in the elements, the screws become loose and fall out. I’ve taken to putting lag bolts in the end so the handles remain in place, but then they don’t spin as freely allowing the birds to roost more than I would prefer. In time, I’ll figure out a better solution (or so I hope) but for now this is my one frustration with the design. It works really well initially, but the guy who designed it doesn’t have to use it everyday until that part fails. Overall these feeders are also easy to put together in just a few minutes with basic PVC primer and glue, and will be ready to use in no time at all after opening the box.
The second issue is simply cost. A 48″ feeder will run you $65 and a 60″ feeder $85 plus shipping. But in my view, they are well worth the expense. They are easy to move, easy to fill, holds a lot of feed, and dramatically mitigate the costly feed waste.
In the end, this is a great piece of equipment that will give you years upon years of solid service and I highly recommend them.
To view the feeders and download a PDF brochure or instruction booklet, you can visit Brower Equipment; however Brower doesn’t sell anything direct so you’ll have to order them from an authorized distributor or thru Amazon.
Note: This post may contain affiliate links. Also, I have not been given any free products, services or anything else by these companies in exchange for mentioning them on the site, unless otherwise mentioned.