anyone else feed road kill?

[NYRIR]

Ummmmm....no.

 

[ChickyLove]

I can't even get my chicks to eat grapes. Roadkill is definitely a no go!

... and ew.

 

[goldtopper]

I'd eat it............but I'd never feed it to my chickens!

 

[Opa]

When I butcher deer I place the trimmed carcass in the run to let the birds get the rest of the meat of the bones. The have a ball with it.

 

[classicsredone]

We mostly get dead skunks around here. Yuck. I think even the chickens wouldn't want to touch that.

I haven't picked up roadkill, but I probably wouldn't hesitate if I hit a deer or other animal. Chickens eat meat. They aren't herbivores. One of the most common feeds, Layena Sun Fresh, is animal protein free. They don't list what else is in the bag of course, but they tout it being vegetarian. I'm eating what my chickens eat if you think about it, so I want to know what they're eating. Fresh roadkill is probably fine. When I lived in the sticks, the deer would usually be hit while they were crossing to the irrigation ditch for a drink of water.

 

[jaseyboy1986]

I'm loving this thread, there's a real divide. I've not fed my flock road kill but I've never thought about doing it as it's never crossed my mind. I don't see the problem with it, it's extra protein for them, they would (no doubt) love it, chickens are natural scavengers so naturally they would eat road kill if they came across it next to the road. I would probably be okay with feeding road kill to the chickens if they are not too badly damaged (I.e squashed as a pancake).

As for those saying you don't know why the animal was walking by the side of the road, most small animals will gain heat from the road on a cold morning, some birds use grit and stones from the road side (as do chickens of course) to aid digestion but most animals that are killed on the road, I'm sure, have nothing wrong with them prior to being hit and have just unfortunately (or fortunately in the eyes of the road kill collector) ran through or been chased through some hedgerows, tall grass etc. right into the road having not known there was a road there. So in my honest opinion (and please bear in mind, we are all entitled to one) you can definitely feed your chooks road kill.

 

[chickengeorgeto]

Considering that I eat what my hens produce, NO WAY!

Considering where eggs come from, I would think that eating an egg produced with the help of a little road kill would be the least of your worries.

 

[Papas Chickens]

I remember reading a few post on this thread from people who say they eat freshly hit deer, which I think this sounds like a really creative idea to get a lot of fresh, free meat.  I was wondering, does it affect the meat that the animal was not immediately bleed out or does is it sometimes bruised from where it was hit?

In some states you are required to contact Fish and Game when you hit a big game animal such as deer, elk, moose, ect. If you dont and they find out you can get fined and or get your hunting privledges takin away for a certain amount of time.

 

[Youpon Ruth]

Dogs who eat dead squirrels (or even sniff them) can get mycotoxin intoxication that while treatable can be life threatening. I'm not sure if chickens can get this or not but I do know that squirrels may harbor parasites, which can be lethal to infants and young children. Internal parasites such as ascarid worms, tapeworms, flukes, and protozoa can cause debilitating and often fatal diseases in humans, while external parasites such as ticks and fleas transmit Rocky Mountain spotted fever, bubonic plague, and other serious diseases.

I personally would never take the chance of feeding anything to my animals that I did not know the source of. If I came across a bag of what appeared to be some sort of grain along side the road, I would never take it home and feed it to my animals. Road kill could have any number of contaminants from the road, cars passing, etc let alone any disease or hitchhiker that the animal was carrying before it was killed.

In nature, lots of animals eat lots of things that would kill our domesticated animals.. This is the same phenomena that a lot of people experience when drinking the water in Mexico... all the natives are just fine but that nice gringo sure did catch a severe case of Montezuma's revenge...

Same water--different tolerances... What a wild chicken, buzzard or other scavenger might survive just fine on, might easily overwhelm the systems of our domesticated chickens.

Just my two cents....