Can my ducks and chickens eat these types of berries? (pics)

jessylee

Songster
9 Years
Oct 11, 2010
136
0
101
Olympia
I have a pasture area I was considering opening up to my chickens and ducks and it has a large 6ft bush in the middle with lost of berries. It concerns me that the local wild life has not eaten the berries. Maybe they are poisonous? Will my birds know better than to eat something poisonous? Can you help me identify this bush, and or do you have birds that eat these berries? Closest I can tell it may be a "aronia_arbutifolia_brilliantissima" Or "Chokeberry"

Any help will be welcomed
Thank you

https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/sSRyxjssEO0zAckSL1-rZA?feat=directlink

https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/5Cr_PWoHVh_L5W4nV1Y22Q?feat=directlink
 
Last edited:
Ray (my SO) says "gooseberries", but doesn't know if they are poisionous. So much for help from the "farm boy". Hope someone else is SURE of their info and can help you.
Bump
 
Well I think it is Chokeberry otherwise known as "Aronia arbutifolia" Are there any plant experts in the house? This web site says they are not to be eaten, witch is what my gut tells me when the local birds wont touch them. Can any one answer if my birds will be smart enough to avoid them if they are poisonous? Does anyone know of chickens or ducks dying from food poison? Here is the site that told me not to feed them what do you think?
http://www.answers.com/topic/photinia-1
 
The ones that have red berries off the top of my head are;

Heteromeles arbutifolia
Pyracantha coccinia
Nandina domestica


Or some type of Cotoneaster such as Cotoneaster dammeri. I would need to see more of the plant. Does it have thorns? How big is it?

Cotoneaster (pronounced /kəˈtoʊniːˈæstər/)[3] is a genus of woody plants in the rose family, Rosaceae, native to the Palaearctic region (temperate Asia, Europe, north Africa), with a strong concentration of diversity in the genus in the mountains of southwestern China and the Himalayas.[4] They are related to hawthorns (Crataegus), firethorns (Pyracantha), photinias (Photinia) and rowans (Sorbus).
Depending on the species definition used, there are between 70 to 300 different species of cotoneaster, with many apomictic microspecies treated as species by some authors, but only as varieties by others.[4][5]
The majority of species are shrubs from 0.5–5 metres (1.6–16 ft) tall, varying from ground-hugging prostrate plants to erect shrubs; a few, notably C. frigidus, are small trees up to 15 metres (49 ft) tall and 75 centimetres (30 in) trunk diameter. The prostrate species are mostly alpine plants growing at high altitude (e.g. C. integrifolius, which grows at 3,000–4,000 metres (9,800–13,000 ft) in the Himalayas), while the larger species occur in scrub and woodland gaps at lower altitudes.
The shoots are dimorphic, with long shoots (10–40 centimetres/3.9–16 inches long) producing structural branch growth, and short shoots (0.5–5 centimetres/0.20–2.0 inches long) bearing the flowers; this pattern often developing a 'herringbone' form of branching. The leaves are arranged alternately, 0.5–15 centimetres (0.20–5.9 in) long, ovate to lanceolate, entire; both evergreen and deciduous species occur. The flowers are produced in late spring through early summer, solitary or in corymbs of up to 100 together. The flower is either fully open or has its five petals half open 5–10 millimetres (0.20–0.39 in) diameter. They may be any shade from white through creamy white to light pink to dark pink to almost red, 10-20 stamens and up to five styles. The fruit is a small pome 5–12 millimetres (0.20–0.47 in) diameter, pink or bright red, orange or even maroon or black when mature, containing one to three (rarely up to five) seeds.[5][6] Fruit on some species stays on until the following year.​
 
Well, I don't know if this is of any help, but I have a chokeberry bush. The leaves look like that, but not so close together and it's the black berry variety. When I got it the tag said to not eat the berries.

I also have an aronia bush, that I bought as an edible berry bush. It is also a black berry variety. Leaves look the same as well.

Unfortunately neither have leaves right now, so I can't take pictures. Both have berries that cluster like your picture.

If memory serves the chokeberry blooms early and sets the berries early, but take a long time to get large and black. The Aronia kind of blooms & berries summer into fall.

Imp
 

New posts New threads Active threads

Back
Top Bottom