Making Cracked Corn

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I want to grow a small crop of corn to supplement store bought animal feed. I already own a corn sheller. Now for the cracking. I have found a source for a cheap deal on a hand powered corn, grain and cereal mill. I'm not interested in making flour or meal. I just want to crack my corn. Is this the right tool for the job? Thanks in advance for your advice.

-- Roscoe Rotten (rkphipps@simflex.com), March 05, 2001

Answers

The hand powered gizmo is for making small quantities for usually home use, it is SLOW!!!!You don't have to crack corn for any farm animal that I know of, the chickens eat it right off the cob, so do horses, goats, pigs, birds, the exception might be cattle, although they just need it shelled, as they have no top incisors to properly bite the kernals off the cob. Corn keeps better kept whole on the cob in a corn crib, the way it's been done the past thousand years or so.

-- Annie Miller in SE OH (annie@1st.net), March 05, 2001.

My cows eat whole corn cobs husks and all .

-- Patty {NY State} (fodfarms@slic.com), March 05, 2001.

I agree, just feed it whole. On chickens, when you feed any grain that is not milled, make sure and provide plenty of grit (we just dump coffee cans full of gravelly sand in the pen - cause our topsoil doesn't have much). In many areas you don't need to do that; but if your soil is real fine, you might have to cause they need it in their gizzards to grind the grain.

-- Cynthia Speer (farmsteader@gvtel.com), March 05, 2001.

My brother was feeding cracked corn to something, (I think wild birds) and he used an old salvaged cannister vacuum sweeper to crack it. He first cleaned the filter, then slowly fed corn into the intake, and retrieved cracked corn from the bag. Said it worked like a dream.

-- Notforprint (Not@thekeyboard.com), March 05, 2001.

If the deal is good on the grain mill....Buy it. You will find many uses for it including having a go at making your own flour.Trust me you WILL wan't to try it.The hand cranked rigs are slooow for making flour but they will crack corn in a jiff as well as turn your chicken pellets into chick starter in the blink of an eye.Also if you must ever tube feed an animal.It's normal ration can be ground sufficiently to pass through a stomach tube. So to answer your question YES it is the right tool for the job.

-- greg (gsmith@tricountyi.net), March 06, 2001.


Burr type cracking mills come in all sizes. Cant think of its name but one inteneded for motorization that would work for 'homesteader with few animals' size but much greater capacity than Corona size mills. They even sell extra fine burrs if you want fine meal or flour, however its prime use was designed to crack grain. Saw one guy set this mounted on an old Massey Harris Pony tractor with a pulley drive so it was mobile. Had it set up so he could leave it in place most of time and still use tractor for other things.

Guess you could also use an old hammer mill if screen was fine enough. Hmm, maybe one of those small hammer mills they sell now to grind up garden waste. Might have to fabricate appropriate screen.

-- Hermit John (hermit@hilltop_homestead.zzn.com), March 06, 2001.


Hi Roscoe. We cracked corn for our chickens with a home built shredder. Had a welder-friend cut a hole in the lawnmower deck, then we built a plywood hopper to fit the hole. Tossed in whole cobs. Worked great! Mower still fine for lawn use too, just screw a plate over the hole. Sandy

-- Sandy in MN (jpevans_56353@yahoo.com), March 06, 2001.

one day I was collecting corn out of the field that the neibors combine didn't get and shelling it for the chickens (free food) and the sherriff came over to chew the fat and he looked over at the chipper/shreader and said wonder what that would do to the corn. well the rest is history. cob and all just throw it in and watch the dust fly. had to take some plywwod and make a box around it because it went all over the place. real close to what sandy did with the mower!

-- lee lynn (dusty29541@yahoo.com), March 09, 2001.

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