Australorps breed Thread

[CluckerFeet]

Here's a picture of my little "Ebony", first day in the permenant coop. She's my first Australorp and my favorite out of 3 Wyandottes and a Barnevelder.

Hey I have an Australorp named Ebony too! Unfortunately I don't have any pictures. Also, three Wyandottes and a Barnevelder? You must have a pretty flock!

 

[bruceha2000]

Granny,
Some say ok and some say no. I have seen no proof either way. Moderation is the key to most question like this good or bad.
Here is a list of the reported bad to feed to chickens.
10 Foods Your Chickens Should Avoid

1. Plants from the nightshade family – Nightshade plants such as potatoes, tomatoes, and eggplants have a toxic substance in their unripened fruit and leaves called solanine that could be harmful to your flock. Even the peels of potatoes are potentially harmful and should be avoided. If you have a large amount of leftover nightshade vegetables (potatoes or peels), cook them first and your chickens will enjoy the treat even more.
2. Salty foods – Foods containing large amounts of salt can lead to a condition known as salt poisoning, salt toxicity, hypernatremia, or water deprivation-sodium ion intoxication. The small bodies of chickens are not meant to ingest large amounts of salt. Chickens can tolerate up to 0.25% salt in drinking water but are susceptible to salt poisoning when water intake is restricted.
3. Citrus – Some varieties of chickens can be very sensitive to citrus. Many believe it is a build up of citric acid and vitamin C that can cause excessive feather plucking. That said, I have fed citrus to my chickens and they don’t care for it.
4. Onions – Onions contain a toxin substance called thiosulphate that destroys red blood cells. When excessive amounts are fed to chickens, it can cause jaundice or anemia in your hens or even death.
5. Dried or undercooked beans – Raw, or dry beans, contain a poison called hemaglutin which is toxic to birds. Cooking or sprouting the beans before serving them to chickens will kill this toxin.
6. Dry rice – If we feed them rice, we cook it beforehand. Chickens that are fed dry rice are put in danger of the rice blowing up when it is introduced to moisture and will cause a gut problem in chickens.
7. Avocado skin and pit – Chickens do not care much for avocados. They probably sense or smell the low levels of toxicity in the skin and pit.
8. Raw eggs – Introducing raw eggs to your chickens could result in your flock turning cannibal. If they are doing this, it could be a result of a deficiency in their diet or because they are stressed. Adding crushed oyster shells to their diet usually helps as well as adjusting their environment (more nesting boxes, lessen the light in the coop, etc.)
9. Candy, chocolate, sugar – Chickens do not have much of sweet tooth. In fact, they only have around 25-30 taste buds, so more than likely, they wouldn’t realize they are eating anything sweet. Further, it’s bad on their digestive tract and chocolate especially contains a toxin called methylxanthines theobromine and is poisonous to chickens. Therefore, adding sugar to their diet wouldn’t be advisable.
10. Apple seeds – Apple seeds contain trace amounts of cyanide that could kill your chicken. As much as chickens love apples, do them a favor and remove the seeds.

The girls get every apple seed that comes into the house. My wife has one pretty much every day. But with 16 girls, the number of seeds/bird is small and who knows which girls get more or less than their share.

Soimeone should give that list to my chickens. They love Tomatoes.. They try to beat us to them, and most the time they do.

Echo (my smaller BA and A1 forager) decided when the first tomato was ripe last summer. I was messing with the beans and cukes with my back to the tomato plant when she came to "help". After a bit she started and ran, then thud. She had been eating the tomato when it dropped. I put bird netting around the tomato cage after that. Not that I'm worried about her eating them, I'm just not willing to share, especially the FIRST one! They get the stem end of the tomato but I eat the rest.

My chickens get tomatoes, potato skins, onions, peppers, and if I have broken egg that is oozing I throw it to them. The only time I get broken eggs is when I have 12 eggs in one nesting box. I have 12 freshly clean nesting boxes but my girls will only us 3-5 nesting boxes.

A couple of my chickens ate the egg out of the shavings I tossed from the nest box (egg laid with no shell) but I have (knock on wood) never had a chicken intentionally break an egg to eat it.

 

[Birdrain92]

None of my girls have been breaking eggs on purpose so that's why the list kind of makes me laugh.

 

[jbkirk]

It is kind of funny watching all you guys poke holes in this list of what the "experts" say is bad for chickens... Just show that most decisions are best left to the individual NOT the community.

Note to Kurt, I'm not calling you a "expert".

 

[appps]

Well I didn't know about the tomatoes. My girls ate our entire crop because it was riddled with fruit fly. All going strong except they are moulting worse than ever before. Half naked chickens everywhere. Coincidence? I don't think so........ ( insert twilight zone theme)

 

[Gramma Chick]

Well I didn't know about the tomatoes. My girls ate our entire crop because it was riddled with fruit fly. All going strong except they are moulting worse than ever before. Half naked chickens everywhere. Coincidence? I don't think so........ ( insert twilight zone theme)

unless they ate so many tomatoes they didnt get enough protein ?
ours eat tomatoes ....they love them ...is it fall there ? as moults usually happen then ......
If you up their protein ...they will feather back quicker

 

[appps]

Lol yes it's fall, but you can imagine how old wives tales start. "They ate tomatoes and I never had a moult like it, must be the tomatoes!"

 

[bruceha2000]

Lol yes it's fall, but you can imagine how old wives tales start. "They ate tomatoes and I never had a moult like it, must be the tomatoes!"

Especially when one sort of "forgets" to mention that these were the first chickens the person ever had and they were going into their first fall as adults and this is their first moult.

It is kind of funny watching all you guys poke holes in this list of what the "experts" say is bad for chickens... Just show that most decisions are best left to the individual NOT the community.

Note to Kurt, I'm not calling you a "expert".

Yep. Best left to the individual chicken

For instance European Bittersweet, AKA Bittersweet Nightshade, Woody Nightshade, poisonberry and many others (Solanum dulcamara). The berries are poisonous to mammals if eaten in quantity. My chickens, however, LOVE them and they suffer no ill health. I guess we don't have European Thrushes here since they are supposed to eat them. But the local birds leave them for my chickens.

And hosta is supposed to be poisonous to chickens. We have a number of them and the chickens have never touched them other than to sleep under them when the sun is high. A woodchuck decimates a variegated one every summer but ignores the others entirely. The chickens seem to know what they shouldn't eat.

 

[RattlesnakeRidgeWV]

It is kind of funny watching all you guys poke holes in this list of what the "experts" say is bad for chickens... Just show that most decisions are best left to the individual NOT the community.

Note to Kurt, I'm not calling you a "expert".

That is good, because I am far from one. I did think that it may help Granny though. I learned most of my advise from my own mistakes like the rest of us on here.
Kurt

 

[RattlesnakeRidgeWV]

One batch of 4 week old "Veloci Raptors" aka BBS Aussies gone, so I can concentrate on more babies!