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What this covers Feed is food With one allowance human food does not get Then the manufacturing rule And one prohibition unlike anything else here Bees count The state layer is the bigger one And the shelf is shaped the wrong way round References

The federal rules are the readable half. The state registrations are the work.

What this covers

Bee feed, livestock supplement, poultry supplement and animal health topical. Three of the four are something an animal eats, which makes them animal food, and the fourth is something applied to an animal, which is a different problem entirely.

Feed is food

FDA regulates animal food, and a supplement is animal food. That brings an ingredient declaration in descending order of predominance by weight, using specific names rather than generic ones.

With one allowance human food does not get

Livestock and poultry feeds may use certain collective names, which is a real simplification where a formula contains several related ingredients. It is an allowance in the regulation rather than a convention.

Then the manufacturing rule

21 CFR 507 sets current good manufacturing practice and risk-based preventive controls for food for animals. A qualified facility is exempt from two of its subparts and still subject to 507.7, which is a smaller obligation rather than none.

And one prohibition unlike anything else here

Protein derived from mammalian tissues is prohibited in ruminant feed. Material containing it carries a sentence printed word for word, and the rule reaches your equipment, your written procedures and a year of records.

Bees count

A colony is livestock for this purpose, and what you feed it is animal food. A sugar syrup or a pollen substitute sold commercially is a feed product with the labeling that implies.

The state layer is the bigger one

Commercial feed is registered state by state, largely to an AAFCO model, with a guaranteed analysis and tonnage reporting. Thirty states is thirty registrations, thirty fee schedules and thirty reporting cycles.

And the shelf is shaped the wrong way round

399 containers with a median of 118 mL. That is a topical shelf. The feed half wants 250 to 4,000 mL and there are 22 containers at a litre or more, so the format decision is worth making before the formula is scaled.

References

21 CFR 501.4, animal food ingredient declaration. Ingredients "shall be listed by common or usual name in descending order of predominance by weight", with specific rather than generic names and limited exceptions; 501.110 permits certain collective names in livestock and poultry feeds. law.cornell.edu

21 CFR 507, current good manufacturing practice, hazard analysis and risk-based preventive controls for food for animals. Under 507.5, "except as provided in subpart D of this part, subparts C and E of this part do not apply to a qualified facility", and qualified facilities "are subject to the requirements in 507.7". The thresholds defining a qualified facility sit in a separate definition and are not quoted here. law.cornell.edu

21 CFR 589.2000, the ruminant feed ban. Protein derived from mammalian tissues is prohibited in ruminant feed, with exceptions including blood products, gelatin, tallow, milk products and porcine or equine protein. Material containing prohibited protein is labeled "Do not feed to cattle or other ruminants". A facility handling both mammalian and non-mammalian protein maintains separate equipment or uses "clean-out procedures or other means adequate to prevent carry-over", with written procedures from receipt through shipment and records kept for at least one year. law.cornell.edu

The Davis Pack Supply catalog, measured 18 October 2026. The animal and apiary shelf is 854 rows: 399 containers and 455 closures, derived from two archetypes across four leaves. 224 PET, 100 HDPE, 74 glass and 1 LDPE, from 10 to 9,464 mL with a median of 118 and 22 containers at a litre or more. The closures include 43 dropper assemblies, 20 dome lids and 16 flip tops.

Written from 21 CFR 501.4, 507.5 and 589.2000, and from the catalog as it stood on 18 October 2026. Commercial feed is also registered and labeled under state law, which this property points at rather than covers; whether a given product is a feed, a supplement or a drug is a determination with consequences, and a medicated feed is a different regime again.