Topic of the Week - Feeding Treats

[dunnmom]

When my chicks were little fluff balls I didn't give them any treats. I started giving them treats after their adolescent feathers were nearly all in, usually scrambled egg, mealworms, or june bugs. When they fully feathered, I added kitchen scraps and weeds. After the first eggs were laid, I would give them scrambled eggs, rolled oats, BOSS, eggshells, bulgur wheat, weeds, kitchen scraps, an occasional ear of sweet corn, halved melons or squashes. I've avoided giving them much cooked or processed foods. They love weeds, june bugs, and BOSS best. Oh, and the cannibals love scrambled egg. I'm going to build a june bug trap for them this year. Mine don't free range, so I try to give them stuff they would usually forage for.

 

[Stephine]

My chicks I raised on homemade feed, so they got "treats" from the get go. Raisins, all kinds of herbs, cooked egg, cottage cheese, etc. I brought clumps of weeds and soil for them once they were about a week old.
Now that they are big they get weeds from the garden, and leafy vegetable scraps or leftovers, squashes, cucumbers, tomatoes, sprouted lentils, mealworms, BOSS. When it's hot, watermelon and ice water with frozen blueberries. Raisins are still their favorite. Also alfalfa hay when the greens are gone in summer and fall.
I don't ever give them grass or hay - they go get their own...

 

[Kareyg]

What is BOSS?

 

[Stephine]

Black Oil Sunflower Seeds

 

[poodlechicks]

What is BOSS?

Black Oil Sunflower Seeds

 

[Russ in Tuscany]

Our 9 + 1 free range all day in our field all year round so find lots of stuff out and about on their own in addition to their own feed. This means that they get a lot of exercise and we think can probably deal with a few extra treat calories.

Most days they get any vegetable waste (potato peelings always microwaved for a few mins) chopped up with egg shells and mixed with stale bread that's been soaked in water and a cup full of dry bran. Favourites are anything to do with cabbage, carrot or especially tomato (including seeds). They love this even more so if the cats have refused some meat scraps, as they go in too.

Otherwise, when we go down to collect eggs or for the daily clean-out beneath their roosting bars, they follow us, demanding something or other. Usually they are quite happy with a handful of their usual mix (seeds plus layer pellets) just thrown onto the grass, as even though they can get it from the feeder any time, they love looking for it on the ground. Sometimes we mix in a few extra sunflower seeds before throwing it.
The other week I bought a large piece of cod, filleted it for myself then put the remainder (bones with some meat still on) into the microwave 'till everything was pretty much cooked. Once it was safely cool I gave it to the girls who went into a kind of feeding frenzy, they loved pecking it to pieces.

Other things they love:
- meat of any kind (in small doses, occasionally)
- Anything like cabbage, kale, spinach, chard

What they aren't keen on:
any citrus at all
Things containing bell peppers
Scraps of our food with too many spices or herbs

What we never give them
Any kind of avocado scraps
junk food (potato chips, cake, anything salty or sweet)

 

[10 acre woods]

Ours get grit from the start. We will offer small bits of soft fruit and vegetables at two weeks of age. We turn our chickens out every evening. The compost pile is close to the run and they help themselves to kitchen scraps and garden waste. Plus they help turn the pile. We also give them dried mealworms. One of our Red Quill hens will jump waist high and grab them from our finger tips.

 

[Kareyg]

Thanks. I'm a New Egg.

 

[missy1971]

I gave my girls a plate of apples, grapes, yogurt and a little scratch...they were so funny chasing after each other with the grapes.
They emptied that platter!

 

[Waddlein]

I have 17 fertile duck eggs in the incubator. What treats can you give ducks?