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boggybranch
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Grow your own poultry feed?

Just rec'd this in email.

https://www.motherearthnews.com/Sustainable-Farming/Grow-Poultry-Feed-What-Chickens-Eat.aspx
...the natural feeds you can produce in your backyard are what chickens would eat in the wild: green plants, wild seeds, and animal foods, such as earthworms and insects — all fresher and more nutritious than anything you can buy in a bag.

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jal_ut
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Chickens will eat about anything except for boxelder bugs. If you had a heart attack and fell down they would eat you too. If you let them range they will sample everything in your garden, and scratch up everything they don't poke holes in. No, they won't eat a whole tomatoe or squash, but they will peck holes in every one looking for the best tasting one. I have even had them scratch up potatoes and poke holes in them. Besides that they will leave their droppings on everything and go to the neighbors and mess on their sidewalks and cars too. If you are going to have chickens and a garden, you need to either fence the garden chicken proof or have a chicken proof run. Whatever you choose it needs to have a lid because the rascals can fly. I perfer to lock up the chickens and toss them goodies from the garden to subsidize that expensive feed I buy at the co-op. To each his own.

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boggybranch
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jal_ut wrote:Chickens will eat about anything except for boxelder bugs. If you had a heart attack and fell down they would eat you too. If you let them range they will sample everything in your garden, and scratch up everything they don't poke holes in. No, they won't eat a whole tomatoe or squash, but they will peck holes in every one looking for the best tasting one.
Do chickens really have taste buds?.....never, really, thought about that. I figured, since there's not much chicken poop in chicken pens.....they didn't have taste buds.

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mrsgreenthumbs
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Ha Ha! Have you ever been around a parrot? Any one with a bird will tell you that they have preferences on what they like and what they don't like. I'm sure chicken's are no different than oh let's say my chihuahua. He's picky and prefers the tasty food on our plats over his own bowl of kibble ;)

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Ozark Lady
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My cockatiel will pick through her food and select only the millet, so I am going to raise millet... that stuff is expensive at the store, and keeps sprouting in every plant she can throw the seeds at...

My chickens also sample the garden alot.

Also, when I feed the goats, certain ones, prefer the goat food to the chicken food, and will leave their food... the others prefer their own food.

Ticks are an issue here, so the chickens have priority.
Without chickens we would be housebound.

I am already eating fresh country free range eggs! And no ticks...

Does that mean that indirectly I am eating the ticks instead of them eating me?

My ducks and geese and chickens to a lesser extent even debug the dogs, the dogs lie down and the birds pick them... like the birds you see in Africa picking off pests.

My feathered friends, truly are part of our 'homestead'.

And I am growing grains to feed the animals, and us... wonder how millet tastes? It is a cereal isn't it?

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jal_ut
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I figured, since there's not much chicken poop in chicken pens.....they didn't have taste buds.
Obvious you never had to clean out a chicken coop where 100 chickens spent a years time.

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jal_ut
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wonder how millet tastes? It is a cereal isn't it?
Millet is quite bland. I recently tasted some puffed millet. It tasted about like puffed rice. IOW tasteless. Lots of birds will eat millet, I guess chickens will. They eat everything else.

Wheat is good chicken feed, and is easily grown here. I dried a bunch of corn last fall and have been feeding that to the chickens.

If you let your chickens range, they have a good diet of greens, and insects. I like to feed some grain also. If they are locked up I like to feed laying mash. It is a complete food. The chickens don't get all they need from just grain. Then when I have garden produce to spare I feed that too.

Years ago I watched 20 free ranging chickens clear 10 acres of grasshoppers. They can be effective insect control. Then the fall migration of Cooper's Hawks came through and the chickens became hawk feed. That is one drawback of ranging chickens, they are vulnerable to predators of all kinds. I have had skunks, coyotes, racoons, dogs, cats, weasels, hawks, eagles and two legged varmints kill chickens. Another reason to lock them up, in a pen that not only keeps the chickens in but the varmints out too.

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boggybranch
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Course they don't like carrots......no teeth. LOL

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Ozark Lady
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Yes, chickens have many predators. You forgot the number 1 killer of my chickens... black rat snakes.

I find dead chickens in the yard, squeezed to death, too large for the snake to eat, and invariably there will be a black rat snake nearby. You can smell the stinking snakes. These are free-range chickens, not caged, free to fly or run away, and the snakes can still manage to kill them. Usually it is a hen with little chickens, and when the snake moves in on the chicks, mama moves in on the snake and loses. So I end up with a snake to eliminate, and orphan chicks to raise.

My dogs (Great Pyrenees Mountain Dogs) do a pretty good job of keeping out the 4 legged critters, and the 2 legged critters don't like barking dogs, so they stay away... but hawks, owls and snakes get past my dogs.

I do feed the chickens too. It keeps them from becoming wild, I feed them just before bedtime, to remind them where home is.
I feed them a mix in the winter months when greens and bugs are scarcer for them, and in summer, just some grains to augment what they found that day.

I do lose some chickens, but, given the choice of living in a cage, and living free, I would rather live one month free than a lifetime of many years in a cage. Today, the hen and her chicks will go free. They are Christmas chicks, caged all winter... and there isn't alot of cover, yet.. but, hopefully mama will teach them well. If not, oh well, they still get a taste of freedom.

I have oats, wheat, rye, triticale, buckwheat and millet seeds to grow this year.
Seems that most of these are fall planted? I may go ahead and try some as a spring crop too. If it fails, it will still be a green manure for the garden. But, some take 4 months, so I may plant them, on new ground that I want to be a garden later.

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rootsy
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Ground corn, soybean meal, oats, maybe grind some alfalfa in, add some minerals and oyster shell... If the chickens are confined and can't roam outside add some grit...

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runfox
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I just planted my first garden, I live on 5 acres in the woods, central florida. My garden is in a closed fence area of my back yard. I have another closed fenced ares where I plan on having chickens. I have fox, cayote, racoons, hawks, you name it in our woods, so free roaming chiknes wouldn't last long here. So I plan on keeping them in thier own fenced area, but then opening their gate and letting then roam our back yard occasionally. I also plan on trimming their flight feathers on one wing so they cant fly over the fence.I figure that way I can move them around to different fenced areas without worrying about them flying out of the fence and trying to chase them back in. I can just hear my wife now, yelling at me that the chickens have gotten out and are out in the woods.

I have to do a bit of a juggling act as we also have Jack Russell terriers that would love to chase and kill anything moving. I may be able to eventually teach them to let the chickens be, but more than likely will never let them near them.

So you all, jal_ut have experince with chickens and gardens. I was wondering if I could let them roam around in my garden occasioanlly , for short period of time, maybe with me supervising, to clean out bugs and such, with out destrying my plants and veggies? Or would that be a disater?

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Ozark Lady
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The only safe way to let chickens into the garden is cages!

Either cage your beds, like I do. Or use chicken tractors, these are simply bottomless cages, but they have roofs to protect the birds from flying predators and coons and possums will climb. But, the chicken tractors can be placed where you want them to be. And if you only put a couple chickens in it, and only place it over grown veggies, they can help.

But, they will peck every tomato, some peppers, and dust and dig in your dirt. Be warned, fresh turned soil, even if it was only to dig a hole to plant is an invitation to chickens to bother it.

I have chickens and ducks and geese, the geese do help weed pathways, and the other poultry can pick bugs that are trying to get from one area to another... but not the veggies.

I have seen folks make chicken runs, all throughout their property, and the chickens can go lots of places, still in cages. Some of these are portable, and you can change areas they have access to.

Jack Russells and birds don't often get along, unless you had grown birds, and baby dogs, then the birds could train the dog to respect them. But, still it would be a special dog to get along with them. But the birds can keep fleas from becoming an issue outside, let the birds out when the dogs are not there. And the dogs could patrol the chicken area and alert you to predators... still they can help each other... just avoid contact.

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jal_ut
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I have had dogs, chickens, geese, and ducks. The dogs can be trained to leave the birds alone. The problem is with dogs that have never had the discipline, coming onto a chicken, it will always go for the chicken and kill it if it catches it. The same goes for dogs and sheep. Farm dogs leave the farm animals alone because they have been taught. I know nothing about Jack Russels. Can they be taught?

I can let my chickens out about half an hour before sundown, and watch them to keep them out of the garden, then they will go back in to roost. They can get some greens and insects to subsidize their diet, but I don't like them in my garden. They do too much damage. After a frost in the fall they can range more.

cynthia_h
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For another discussion on dogs vs. chickens, see https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=104993

where the OP's Springer Spaniel puppy killed a chicken.

Cynthia

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Ozark Lady
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Even my Great Pyrenees pups must be trained to leave poultry alone, and they are bred for farms, and livestock.

I simply make sure that I have a hen with chicks, handy when the pups are young... the pup gets near her babies, whamo... instant lesson, yelling pup and no one is seriously hurt... the hens noise is much worse than her bite... But they remember and avoid chickens after that.

Jack Russells are pretty smart. But very active, that very exuberance, is usually what gets them into trouble.

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runfox
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Thanks all, well I can train the dogs to leave the chickens alone eventually, but it will take work as the dogs are mature and I don't have the chickens yet, so I wil have to wait until the chickens grow to full size to be able to peck for themselves first.

Main thing I was wondering about and you all answered, cant let the chickens into garden. Not even before fruits appear on the plants huh? I was thinking if I had any bug problems in the garden the chickens could help, but I guess they might do more harm than good.

crobi13
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Ozark Lady wrote:Ticks are an issue here, so the chickens have priority.
Without chickens we would be housebound.

I am already eating fresh country free range eggs! And no ticks...

Does that mean that indirectly I am eating the ticks instead of them eating me?
Do ticks bite chickens or do the chickens eat the ticks? I have chickens and I'm just geting ready to put them outside for the first time. I never thought about ticks being a pest that I would have to worry about. :?

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mrsgreenthumbs
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I would think both. Ticks get on bird's all the time, same with mite's. But the chicken should be able to pick it off and snack on it... (gulp, gross) unless it's somewhere she can't reach like the back of her head. That's what sister's are for ;).

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Ozark Lady
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The chickens will eat them.

We had an infestation of fleas at one house, not here..
And ticks were really bad.
We used poisons, and I promise it was like eggs were in the bags, they got worse and worse. We were housebound.
We got some chickens, within hours the fleas and ticks were gone around the house.
Early the next morning our dog had killed every chicken.
Dog was a good dog, so we gave him to farmers without chickens.
And got some more chickens.
The chickens would go lay in the flea areas, and roll around, getting fleas on themselves, and then they would snack off of each other... funny to watch them.
My dogs lie down and the chickens walk all over them, eating every flea and tick they can find.
Chicken mites are handled by a bag of diatomaceous earth, just put in a box, where chickens can roll in it and dust themselves.

joshbuchan
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chicken :D were to start, they make me laght ay!

my silkies eat anything, cooked/raw carrots, cooked,raw potatos, pasta, rice, hole tomatos, cucimba ect and anything crawling they can get there hands on but they dnt like slugs, my marans and warrans fight for slugs and chase eachother around there pen trying to woof it down, my legbars dnt eat much, pellet, bread, pasta and lettis thats abouth it nothing living :evil:

once I seen a mouse rune across the pen and fide under the fence, well his tail was hanging out and I tossed a bit of bread over but my big maran (shes the boss) ran over and ate the bit of bread then she seen his tail and must of fort it was a worm, well she picked up his tai to find there was a mouse on the end of it, knowing the rest they run over so she runs of still with a mouse hanging out of her beek sqeeling for his life, all after alot of fighting and a lot of laghting from my part the mouse got away un harmed but mentaly scared I bet. so yeah depending on the breed they will eat anything or only some things.



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