Jeff is a poultry nutritionist who’s spent three decades working with pastured poultry producers. He’s done more than anyone else to raise awareness about the need to feed your chickens digestive grit. Digestive grit is very different to shell grit. To see pictures of the kind of stones he’s talking about, check out his article in the September 2025 issue of Chook Journal, a fully digital experience available now on our website chookjournal.com.au

In this conversation Jeff explains:

* How digestive grit (insoluble for mechanical digestion in the gizzard) is completely different to shell grit/oyster shell (soluble source of calcium)

* That most soil types do not contain enough rocks and stones to supply chickens with the amount of right-size grit they need to consume every month

* His lightbulb moment when he discovered the importance of digestive grit

* The mechanism by which rocks and stones benefit chickens (and all poultry)

* How digestive grit protects against intestinal worms

* Why some worms are normal and actually healthy in chickens (as is some coccidiosis)

* What types of stones you can use to DIY digestive grit since there's no ready-made product sold in Australia

* What size grit for what age chicken

* How to start baby chicks on grit

Heather Soane was the first person to show black copper Marans in Australia. She'd been breeding the birds for several years by the time they were officially imported, and believes her bloodline was smuggled into the country from Belgium or Poland.

In this conversation Heather discusses:

• Why she believes her black copper Marans were smuggled into Australia rather than being "Aussie line" recreations
• How she bred them and what faults she encountered including mossiness, loose feathering ("bustles") and lack of copper colouring on the females
• Her understanding of how the French achieve such dark eggshell colours
• The impact of Croad Langshan blood on some lines of Australian black coppers
• How she kept her line pure without introducing any outside blood for a decade
• How she ended up with 10 different varieties including blue coppers that emerged spontaneously from within her wheaten and black copper Marans
• How she created her own line of cuckoo Marans by using Barred Plymouth Rocks
• The resistance she encountered when first showing Marans
• The particular diet she feeds her Marans
• Who her influences and mentors have been
• What variety she's working on now

Meet your host, former foreign correspondent turned heritage chicken breeder Jane Cowan and get a first listen to highlights from season 1 of Chook. The Podcast, a show for backyard chicken keepers and serious breeders.