Do Natural Chicken Remedies Really Work?

[saving grace]

Hello, I've had this question for a while now but something recently came up that pushed me to actually make a thread about it. I am aware this topic is extremely controversial and there's probably no easy answer, but I am very curious to hear others people's opinions on this subject.

So, a couple days ago one of my five-week old chicks very suddenly became lethargic and could barely move. I diagnosed it as cocci and I immediately ordered some CORID. (That chick sadly passed away today. ) Anyway, I have a friend who's been keeping chickens for 25+ years and is extremely natural. I had a talk with her about how she deals with cocci and she told me she has always used colloidal silver and a little DE in the feed to treat cocci and it has always worked for her (she said she had a couple chicks die every now and then, but that's to be expected, I think). She apparently has also successfully cleared up a respiratory infection with colloidal silver, always has used DE and herbs as lice/mite preventative and wormer without any issues and great success. In all her years of chicken keeping she never bought any wormer, and it sounds like she used natural remedies for any issues she had in her flock.

In my own research over the years I have come to my own opinion that DE is often useless and can be harmful, so I stopped using it. (Oh, by the way, she is very aware of the fact that DE is harmful for chickens to breathe in and is very careful with it. She is a very capable, honest, caring person, so it's not like she doesn't do her research and her chickens are suffering from her ignorance.)

I wish I could just believe all of this and start implementing it in my flock since it sounds so simple, but in my research most everyone says natural remedies usually aren't strong enough to deal with most issues. Clearly she must have had enough success with going natural, since she had healthy flocks of chickens for decades and made a successful business out of it as well.

I'd love to hear your thoughts and opinions!

 

[nuthatched]

Ooh, good question.
I was raised with nautropathic and herbal medicine, the Highland white box of homeopathic tablets features prominently in my memories.
Natural products can help and heal but you have to be careful with it since can also harm.
It boils down to:
If it can help, it can harm.
If it can't harm, it can't help. (It's inert)
No formally trained herbalist or naturopath will tell you that there's no risk involved, including nasty side affects, permanent health issues or even death. Some very popular herbs have very deadly consequences if you OD.
I'm leary of the term 'natural', while I'm sure you aren't taking this to the farthest rationale course, if someone wanted to raise chickens "100% naturally" it would mean:
No coop, no run, no providing of feed or water, reguardless of environmental needs, no protection from predators, no attempt at rescuing birds from predators, no treating of wounds, disease or illness, no putting the animal down humanely if it's clear they're suffering..etc
Since the majority of us don't keep or birds this way, the majority of us can only claim natural feed at best.
Most natural remedies are ineffective or plain dangerous and Research should be made into their safety and efficacy before using. And no, I'm not touting synthetic drugs either, those should only be used once an issue is confirmed and within the recommended doses due to chemical resistance of parasites, infections and side effects.

 

[Perris]

Clearly she must have had enough success with going natural, since she had healthy flocks of chickens for decades and made a successful business out of it as well.

The evidence is before you. Why don't you don't trust that, and a friend, and instead ask complete strangers on the internet for their opinions, when you have no idea how well- or ill- informed they are?

 

[Shadrach]

Of course natural chicken keeping works. If it didn't chickens would have died out long ago.
However, usually that isn't what people mean when the post such questions.
What they usually mean is can I buy hatchery chickens, lock them in a coop and run, feed them commercial feed and then throw some herbs at them when the chickens get sick or troubled by parasites.

If one is prepared to let the chickens free range, forage for their food bar food scraps and produce grown at their location, roost in the trees, keep roosters, go broody and hatch chicks, then sure, natural chicken keeping works just fine.
Predators will deal with your sick birds. Breeding will replace them.

Of course, one needs the space and environment to do this and more importantly the preparedness to let nature kill off ones favourite cute little fluffy butts.

 

[saving grace]

I'm leary of the term 'natural', while I'm sure you aren't taking this to the farthest rationale course, if someone wanted to raise chickens "100% naturally" it would mean:

Yeah, I guess my title is silly and doesn't fit what I was trying to ask. What I meant to say was, can you keep a healthy flock of chickens successfully only using natural remedies for illness, parasites, etc.? (I changed the title for clarity.)

boils down to:
If it can help, it can harm.
If it can't harm, it can't help. (It's inert)
No formally trained herbalist or naturopath will tell you that there's no risk involved, including nasty side affects, permanent health issues or even death. Some very popular herbs have very deadly consequences if you OD.

This makes total sense to me. My friend say there was practically no way chickens could be harmed by the colloidal silver, and she never measured it out when adding it to their water. That also goes against my research since people say you have to be very, very careful with it.

I forgot to mention this in the first post, but my friend also has used hydrated lime in the past to disinfect the coops after the chickens had coccidiosis. She would just sprinkle some all around the floor then top it with a thick layer of shavings so the chickens' feet wouldn't get burned. However, after also researching this, it seems everyone advises against using hydrated lime anywhere near chickens since it's very dangerous.

This is all so confusing, and it seems no one can fully agree on anything.

 

[nuthatched]

Yeah, I guess my title is silly and doesn't fit what I was trying to ask. What I meant to say was, can you keep a healthy flock of chickens successfully only using natural remedies for illness, parasites, etc.? (I changed the title for clarity.)

This makes total sense to me. My friend say there was practically no way chickens could be harmed by the colloidal silver, and she never measured it out when adding it to their water. That also goes against my research since people say you have to be very, very careful with it.

I forgot to mention this in the first post, but my friend also has used hydrated lime in the past to disinfect the coops after the chickens had coccidiosis. She would just sprinkle some all around the floor then top it with a thick layer of shavings so the chickens' feet wouldn't get burned. However, after also researching this, it seems everyone advises against using hydrated lime anywhere near chickens since it's very dangerous.

This is all so confusing, and it seems no one can fully agree on anything.

It's hard to find good info since most info out there is on blogs ( the chicken chick is the exception, she researches what she puts out) or media and isn't necessarily backed by research. Last winter, I spent a few months researching natural wormers and natural remedies in general on peer reveived scientific paper websites, the only two natural worming solutions that had the possibility to work, also could harm or kill my birds if I didn't get the right product or dose.
I used the Bielefeld Academic Search Engine and other research sites I found here.
https://www.scribendi.com/academy/articles/free_online_journal_and_research_databases.en.html
I haven't looked into coop cleaning products, since I barely clean my coop.

 

[DLA]

I think some of the natural old-style remedies can be effective. For example I remember many a time grandpa sent me out with the brushes, scrapers and whitewash lime to scrub down and repaint the coops/laying boxes. That kept the mites and lice in check. But how people raised chickens 50 years ago or longer has changed from how many people keep chickens today. My grandpa and many of the neighboring farms all had chickens and he had a lot of them but it was often a lot more of a revolving door because they just weren't expected to live that long. They either got big enough to be processed for eating/selling or they were kept on as long as they were laying. You always had some hens and a few roosters you kept to breed replacements but they were often being replaced too. The natural measures were just to keep them healthy and alive long enough to get the product because that was their purpose. They weren't normally treated as pets. Nowadays many people keep smaller flocks and treat them more like pets - myself included so I use natural things when I can but I wouldn't hesitate to get that more modern medicine to keep one of my girls alive and healthy into her more senior years even if she had stopped laying.

 

[K0k0shka]

There's a lot of luck involved in chicken keeping. For example, some people don't vaccinate against Marek's and have never had any problems in many years of chicken keeping, claiming that it's the natural mumbo-jumbo they do that's somehow giving their chickens super immune systems and keeping them safe from disease. While others do exactly the same, and lose their entire flocks to the disease. It's just the luck of whether it happens to be present in your environment or not, but listening to people, you'd think it's what they did or did not do. It's the same with so many things, and not just chickens - your own health, your kids, your dogs. When you are on a stretch of good luck, it goes to your head and you want to take the credit, swearing that it's your vegan smoothie or herbal mix or whatever that's doing the magic. When in fact it's just luck and circumstance. You can probably sway things a little one way or the other, but to claim that you can use natural remedies to actually prevent or treat diseases that have taken scientists so much time, money and effort to tame with medicine... well then if it was that easy, modern medicine would not exist! And the people of the past who only had natural remedies at their disposal, would not have been dying off in droves from the most mundane things before they even reached 40. Even the most die hard naturalists will come begging for modern medicine when push comes to shove and their methods fail, and their lives are on the line... But when the going is good, they love to hate on science.

A lot in chicken keeping comes to risk - how willing you are to take certain risks, and what your priorities are. Me personally, I don't like unnecessary risks. I don't have an agenda to rebel against science and modern medicine. It has saved my life and is the reason why I still walk this earth. I come from a long line of farmers and remember the "good old days" when all you had was herbs and weeds. The stories I've heard from mom and grandma about how much suffering those days held - by both people and animals - because of the lack of basic medicine. People nowadays are too far removed from that reality, and idealize it, with rose tinted glasses on. But the people who have actually lived it, don't want to go back. They can appreciate what progress has given us. I embrace progress. Herbs belong on my roast, not in my medicine cabinet.

 

[HereForTheChicks]

For what it's worth here's my experience with pastured chickens, mostly prevention over curing serious diseases:

-They're healthier when I switch from throwing feed in the grass (I thought this was more "natural") to putting their feed in chicken feeders. That way they got more grit (very important to put lots of grit) and never accidentally ate poop off the ground or long pieces of grass which is bad for their crops. Lots of grit is probably the most important thing you can do to have healthy chickens in my opinion.

-I put DE under the bedding in the nesting boxes. I used to think DE was worthless as I've trapped insects in jars with DE and seen them walking around days later. But last year one of the DE-free nesting boxes got infested with red mites. I cleaned it out and added DE with new pine shavings and it fixed the problem, though maybe it was a coincidence.

-Give them access to 3 different waters - one plain, one with apple cider vinegar, and one with electrolytes

-Access to dust baths

-For parasites I give them Aquasol after I see worms in poop. Tried pumpkin seeds in the past and saw no results.

 

[Folly's place]

Those 'good old days' weren't actually that good! KK is so right here, and I'm old enough to remember some of this, and family stories from even a century ago, not so nice.
Mary