I planted 2 of the "Illinois everbearing mulberry" trees before I even built the Coop and Run cause I had read in an old book that the old timers would plant mulberries to help feed. I figured to go one better and selected the Illinois everbearing cause it drops mulberries for 10 - 12 weeks vs the local midwest wild mulberries which only drop for 2. It has worked out great, I enlarged my run last year and fenced in my garden with a shared fence---I let in the chickens to the garden in the fall and winter and they do a wonderful job of cleanup and tilling for me. Any way, I liked the free food dropping to the chickens so much, I planted additional trees in the enlarged run to extend the food drop seasons----- Apples for mid summer to fall and persimmons for fall thru early winter. I also plant tomatoes in cages in the run that will grow up over the cage and drop tomatoes to the chickens til frost. Of course with the garden sharing a fence of the run I toss spoiled/surplus and trimmings over the fence to them.
Now, remember, I started in BC (before computers and the internet). So check out my BYC page to see how it looks and turned out for me.
