Anybody have any ideas for chicken entertainment?

[Farming Frenzy]

Check out my qrticle on decorating your chicken coop... Might give you some ideas

 

[clucknbell]

Frozen watermelon from the markdown section in the produce sections @ the stores


Chicken swing with treats only in reach from the swing


Additional Ideas: Throw out some scratch grains/black oil sunflower seeds, meal worms, hen cakes, apple pieces/tomatoes/ect.

 

[chiklee]

keep them busy with a large wind chime . Musical chickens.

 

[Devon07]

I have the water supply sitting on a flat stone and it spills here and there leaving it moist under it....I move it weekly just in time for bugs to gather. they like when I carry the water jug.....I thought they were glad to have it freshly refilled but turns out they wanted bugs UNDER it.

 

[Farming Frenzy]

Oops sorry i thought you knew, its on ly profile page but here is the link https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/decorating-your-coop-some-ideas-and-tips

 

[sixcitychicks]

Mine like a fresh pile of garden dirt, a foil pie pan, new bedding, and when I did up their straw in the run, they think it's new again, and begin pecking. I want to try the bird swing, but I don't have room. Mind also like pulling the bark off dry logs, and they even have pecked a giant crator in one of them. I give them logs and branches to hop over and perch on.They also like grass with the roots and dirt attached.

 

[gardenfairy]

So many wonderful ideas!

I've never seen a bored chicken - they always seem to be exceptionally busy with something, but mine most certainly love climbing / flying up onto their jungle gym, dusts baths, digging and anything involving food items. Sometimes we make them mini pancakes with blueberries and toss the pancakes in at random spots. The gals run all over the place trying to find them.

The thing that really gets my gals excited are straw bales. Every now and then I drop a few new bales into their run, remove the strings and let them go to town. They climb all over them and scratch like crazy, looking for stray wheat/oat seeds and bugs. It doesn't take long before the bales are spread evenly over the run. It saves me having to do it and they have a great time of it!

 

[Noobie farmer]

When I was researching safe vs toxic plants Cilantro and Parsley were no-no's. Anyone have any input since chickens will eat just about anything including toxic plants - i.e. tomato vines and leaves are no-no's but some will stupidly indulge anyway.

Mine LOVE Yellow Woodsorrel and its good for them. Its often eaten as a salad green by people and its high in vitamin C. It grows in most yards as a weed in the Southern half of the US.
This stuff, especially when its fruiting:

Fruits look like this and taste a little like sweet and sour candies:

 

[Sylvester017]

Well I give them cilantro and they love. Here were I live you can buy it everywhere. Maybe it's not the same cilantro. I don't know but my chicken love it.

Chickens will eat a lot of things we give them but not necessarily good for them. Like I stated before, tomato vines/leaves are toxic to humans and chickens yet I have a Leghorn that keeps wanting to eat the tomato leaves so we have to fence off the garden. I grow a LOT of cilantro for ourselves but do not feed it to the chickens since it is like tomato plants and is toxic to them. One lady in India was feeding garlic and onions to her chickens and couldn't figure out why they were getting ill - onions are toxic to most animals including dogs - it causes leukemia conditions. Just passing along info but you have the ultimate decision.

 

[Pretty Chickens]

They love the raisins, bananas and mangos. I give them the hole banana and they go craze over it.