Make your own poultry feed –part 1: starter mesh

Many people decide to rear birds in their back yards, as a hobby, for personal use and some for small commercial purpose.

What ever the reason or purpose, you may sometimes wish you’ll stop buying expensive feeds from the store. Some of which do not provide sufficient nutrients to your birds for your desired growth. If so, your problem is solved.

Why produce feeds your self:

·        provides better knowledge of poultry nutrition

·        saves fund

·        raise your birds to taste

·        source of income

·        independence form commercial feed producers

General ingredients:

·        Grains:

·        corn

·         barley

·        guinea corn                 

·         wheat         concentrates

·         oats

·         sorghum,

·         Rice

·         e.t.c                          

               

Also included are:

      Wheat bran, mill feed, rice bran, Milling by products, etc.

·        Soybean meal

·        peanut meal

·        cottonseed Meal      proteins

·        safflower meal

·        sesame meal

·         Meat meal

·        fish meal

etc.

(Soybean meal is the preferred protein source.

If meat meal or Fish meal is unavailable, soybean meal may be substituted.)

Alfalfa meal

Vitamin supplement: A,D & B

Vitamin Supplement Must supply

200,000 I.U. of Vitamin A, 80,000 I.C.U. of vitamin D, 100 mg. Riboflavin. Pastured/ Free range poultry receive ample vitamins A and D from grass and sunshine.

Calcium supplement:

·        Bone meal,

·        Deflourinated declaim phosphate

·        Grounded limestone

·        marble

·        oyster shells

Minerals (Trace):

·        Mineral salt or iodized salt supplemented with 1/2 oz. of manganese sulfate and 1/2 oz.of zinc oxide.)

Starter Mesh for Broilers & Pullet:

Note: 1 pound = 0.45359237 kilograms

Ingredients	Proportion (1kg/100kg of mix)
Grounded corn	20.7
Wheat bran	4.5
Soy bean meal	17.775
Fish meal	2.25
Alfalfa	1.8
Vitamin supp.	0.9
Salt	0.63
Bone meal/oyster	0.9
Marble/limestone	0.45

   

   How much should I feed my chickens?

Layers will eat about 2 pounds of starter feed in its first 6 weeks of life. Broilers which are used for meat will need about 8 pounds of starter feed in its first 6 weeks of life. (These breeds are bred to grow extremely rapidly, and are harvested at 2 months of age which is its table age.)

Coming soon!!!

Make Your Own Poultry Feed – part 2: Grower Mesh for Pullets, Broilers and Turkey

How to make candles. ;sourcing materials in Nigeria

candles are an important source of lightning in third world countries, especially in Africa where power supply is very irregular.

Candle making could be brisk business in these countries; almost every one uses them for lightning or for religious purposes, others for personal use because of its colours and scenting.Well designed candles of various sizes can be very marketable.

We would be taking you through the basic process of producing candles in the home; this process could be adopted for small scale business production.

MATERIALS:

·         Containers of some sort

·         A container blend wax

·         Appropriate wick for your jar and wax

·         Colour and fragrance as desired

·         Wick bars or a plastic straw to keep the wick cantered

·         Plastic Straw

·         Basic candle making equipment

Steps:

• Using a straw to hold the wick, apply a bit of hot glue into the bottom of the wick tab and press it firmly into the centre of your container. It's important that it be cantered well or the candle will not burn well.
• Weigh out the wax and melt it your melt pot. If you need to figure out just how much wax you'll need for your particular container.
• Add colour and fragrance oil.
• Stir to allow proper mixture of colour and fragrance
• Slowly pour the wax into the jars. Be careful not to overfill them - and be sure to leave a little extra wax in case you need to do a second pour.
• Let the wax cool down to about 150-160 degrees.
• Take the jars out of the oven.

Place them close together, This helps the jars to cool more slowly - which also helps combat the "wet spots." are actually not "wet", it's just a place where part of the wax has separated from the jar, and part is still sticking. There is no way to completely prevent them, but one way to minimize them is to pre-heat your jars. just put the jars on a cookie sheet and place them into a lightly warm oven - about 150 degrees is just right - warm enough to heat the jars, cool enough to not melt the wick

• After pouring, make sure that all of your wicks are well cantered.
• Let the candles cool slowly. You can wrap a towel around the group to help them cool more slowly. Be careful not to move your well-cantered wicks.
• Smooth the tops of the candles by topping or scrapping lightly.
• Once the candles are fully cooled - several hours/overnight - trim the wicks to about 1/4". Let the candles cure for a couple days before burning them to get the best scent throw and burning.

Sourcing materials:

Sourcing materials locally could be the greatest hurdle yet, few producers are not willing to disclose prices of materials.

For the sake of you our guest we went through task of getting a marketer who would be willing to give a preliminary estimate and address for sourcing here in Nigeria

Here : Fountainoil Enterprises • Fountain oil • P.O. Box 2578 • Minna, Niger 23401, Nigeria • +234 08053440608 • +234066220130

For comments and more info, contact:

ideamarketblog@bmail.com

eboigbelive@gmail.com

eboigbelive@yahoomail.com

Phone no: 08053843268

HOW TO MAKE YOGURT: SOURCING MATERIALS IN NIGERIA

Yogurt is a microbial fermented product, produced from; milk-wet or powdered. Soy beans can also be used.
Yogurt is commercially available commonly as ice cream, and in supermarkets for home use. These are usually produced from raw cow milk inoculated with specific bacteria specie.
Yogurt production is not very difficult; it can be done at home with relative ease. We would be giving you two methods.
Yogurt making materials
• Whole milk(raw, powdered)
• Soy beans(alternatively)
• Commercial starter/fermented maze steep water
• Flavour
• Sugar
• Thermometer
• Blender
• Cooking pan/pot
• Heat source
• Refrigerator
• Pressure cooker
With these you are ready to start.
Step 1:
PREPARING YOUR SOY BEANS
1) To get soy been milk, blend briskly (break in small bits) , soak in water for 1hour (to avoid the soy bean flavour in finished yogurt , soaking with warm water may be preferable )

2) When properly soaked, blend smoothly


3) Add water proportionately and sieve with cheese cloth or muslin cloth. Alternatively use any clean cloth like pillow case note: sterilize by heating before use.

4) Milky liquid collected contains 40% protein.
Note: when using powdered milk, dissolve proportionately in water.

STEP 2:
Heat the milk.
Raw Milk needs to be heated to about 75-80oc, in your pressure cooker, if you don’t have, pasteurize over boiling water for 15-20 minutes. do not let it exceed 800 c milk may be scorched.
Heating helps to kill unwanted bacteria, and bacteria viable spores that may be present in the milk, it is also allows the milk to firm up.
Step 3:
COOL THE MILK AND INOCULATE
Once milk reaches 800c maximum turn off the heat source, and stair gently until it cools to about 40-450c.
Time to inoculate- add some of the commercial starter to the hot milk, stair until it mixes well enough. And allow time for the bacteria to grow.
At this stage, flavouring, sugar can be added to taste.
NOTE: Fermented maize water steep has been found to contain lactic acid bacteria which can ferment protein with no significant difference compared to commercially available bacteria starters.
The good news is that maize water steep can be easily sourced even from village women who ferment maze for pap.
Step 4:
KEEP WARM:
Pour into containers, load into incubator and maintain at 40 – 43 degree Centigrade for 4 - 6 hours. Incubator could be improvised. With pot/cooler pour warm water of about 450c into it and maintain it at that temperature for about 4 – 6 hours.
Do not open lid, feel water regularly and keep water warm. Do not shake yogurt in containers it would disturb the firming process.
Step 5:
REFRIGERATE:
Cover and keep the yogurt in the refrigerator, allow for cooling at least for 24hrs.
Your yogurt is ready for eating.
Allow yogurt to ferment for 2 weeks, if you want to use it as starter for your next yogurt batch
Sourcing materials:
Materials Sourcing
Cost (#)
Raw milk Local dairy (Mallams)
400/LITERE
Commercial starter Chemical store 120
Soy beans Local market 250 /paint rubber
Thermometer Chemical/ laboratory sales shop variable
Maze water steep Fermenting maze Self fermentation/ raw pap producers

PRECAUTIONS:
1. Make sure all equipments are sterilized
2. Monitor temperature , the right temperature is pivotal to an excellent result
3. Do not disturb yogurt during fermentation
4. Flavouring and sugaring should be done to care
Note: for supplies of materials, cost estimate, feasibility studies contact us:
ideamarketblog@gmail.com ; eboigbelive@gmail.com ; eboigbelive@yahoomail.com
Phone no: 08053843268