bad or half-baked chicken advice you've received?

[The Yakima Kid]

Quote:
That is actually true. The reason for this is not only to protect the health of the breeding birds; but also because some diseases are transmitted vertically, into the egg. One problem with free range that isn't mentioned is that it not only increases the risk of parasites, but it increases the risk of salmonella because of what the chickens find to eat. That said, mine get to roam the garden and repeatedly discover that they really don't like to eat snails, which can be both a disease vector and a source of parasites.

 

[The Yakima Kid]

chickenn@@b :

That right there is the biggest problem with the half-baked advice on this forum....chickens are ridiculously easy to keep. There isn't much complexity in keeping chickens at all, merely in wading through all the nonsense and finally realizing that anybody can raise a chicken successfully with relative ease if they just use common sense and listen to a few old timers, try it on for size and make adjustments as you go along. Just like any other enterprise involving animals, it's a learn as you go prospect....but the learning curve is so incredibly easy that a child can master it

For someone like me, who has never owned chickens, it's a BIG curve. I am very new to chickens. I researched these forums for months before joining, and continue to read, almost every day, for advice, stories, etc. Some things are easy to work out, such as the "no eggs if you don't have a rooster" theory

, but others aren't. Like worming, should I worm? they don't appear to have worms, but should I do it as a preventative? SOme people do, some people don't, some try the more natural preventatives, etc....

But for my best half baked chicken advice I've received, the no rooster=no eggs theory, of course. My boss still doesn't believe me and mine aren't laying yet to prove it

The best information sources for children and teenagers are 4H and FFA; for adults try your poultry extension agents. The latter have all sorts of information on how to keep backyard sources. I sometimes joke that everything I know about poultry I learned in FFA and from the extension agent.

 

[kcwazzu]

The way I see it, chickens have been raised for eggs and meat for hundreds if not thousands of years. As long as they get food, water and protection from predators its pretty much a no brainer to raise them.
As far a cleaning out their waterers, daily or weekly, I see no point as mine will always drink from rain puddles in the run that have who knows what in them.
Everyone has there own way of pursuing this hobby and I definitely appreciate all the advice I get from BYC but sometimes it seems some people want to coddle their chickens. Don't get me wrong, I love my chicks and what they provide me, but they have many years of evolution on their side and the appear to be pretty hardy critters.

Keith

 

[Daisy8s]

Quote:
I'm not understanding the statement about "too high in salt". When I feed compost to my chickens it is fruit and vegetable scraps that are removed before any cooking or flavoring has been done (e.g. lettuce leaves, raw carrot peelings, apple cores, bad tomatoes straight from the garden, etc.). I'm not giving them any meat or dairy or processed foods (e.g. bread).

Also, I can agree that a purely homemade diet might be imbalanced but my chickens are given all the commercial feed they want as well as access to the above compost items as well as the opportunity to free range. I am not asking the chickens to live on only compost and free range, and I'm certainly not grinding my own grains.

I'm very willing to learn why the idea of allowing chickens access to all the compost they want is a bad idea since I run across it frequently...but I haven't yet found an explanation that fits how I feed my chickens.

 

[Beekissed]

You are puzzled because you haven't had access to a good book on livestock nutrition; once you have it all becomes clear, Grasshopper.

And in this lies much of the problems with confusion about how to raise chickens. Most of the books on livestock nutrition have not been written by anyone who actually raised those livestock for the better part of their life, experimented with all aspects of nutrition and the results in their own livestock and then decided to recommend that to others. Those books are primarily touting the USDA accepted feed regimen for that particular livestock.

I would never rely on the USDA for any good information that pertains to small flocks of chickens raised in a backyard or on a farm.

The calcium from greens is not particularly well absorbed by poultry or people

This couldn't be MORE wrong. It was wrong the moment the USDA made the food pyramid that stated dairy products were the best source of calcium for humans way back in the day and it's still wrong today. The calcium received from eating green, leafy vegetables is not only more soluble and nutritional for humans, it is proven to be better for their health than is dairy or red meats.

When given a choice, chickens consume a large number of green, leafy vegetation and I can't imagine that they are doing that for any other reason that it is good food for their bodies. It is no mystery why the largest boned, strongest-boned animals on earth are vegetarians.​

 

[Daisy8s]

Quote:
This couldn't be MORE wrong. It was wrong the moment the USDA made the food pyramid that stated dairy products were the best source of calcium for humans way back in the day and it's still wrong today. The calcium received from eating green, leafy vegetables is not only more soluble and nutritional for humans, it is proven to be better for their health than is dairy or red meats.

When given a choice, chickens consume a large number of green, leafy vegetation and I can't imagine that they are doing that for any other reason that it is good food for their bodies. It is no mystery why the largest boned, strongest-boned animals on earth are vegetarians.

That's a great point, Beekissed! (my emphasis added)

 

[georgiagail]

The concern regarding calcium absorption revolves around the presence of oxalic acid found in higher amounts in some greens (typically spinach, chard and beet greens).

Oxalic acid is a natural product found in spinach and some other plant foods including rhubarb. It imparts a sharp taste to beet greens and chard. Concentrations of oxalic acid are pretty low in most plants and plant-based foods, but there's enough in spinach, chard and beet greens to interfere with the absorption of the calcium these plants also contain.

For example, although the calcium content of spinach is 115 mg per half cup cooked, because of the interference of oxalic acid, one would have to eat more than 16 cups of raw or more than eight cups of cooked spinach to get the amount of calcium available in one cup of yogurt.

Gail

 

[Chinchilla2]

Quote:
I'd rather eat the spinach than the yogurt but that's just me. The birds don't care either way.

 

[chics n more]

My cousin doesn't have nest boxes for her hens-she just picks up her eggs where ever they were laid on the dirt floor (because that's the way her grandmother did it). This freaks me out- does it matter? I don't know but I like getting my eggs out of a box full of clean hay.

 

[Beekissed]

That's pretty lazy. Doesn't take much to make a nest box and it sure is better for the hen...not to mention safer and cleaner for the eggs.