Eat with chickens

[MWSIFarm]

Lovely fresh stuff there! On that note……. How much fruit scraps can you give chickens? Is the sugar an issue or is it more just not too much of 1 thing, so much fruit here goes to waste from the orchard I want to give them some but dont want to just dump tons of it on them!

 

[MWSIFarm]

Well i chopped up some plums (thats what we are harvesting at the moment) added with last night scraps some capsicums (or bell peppers for you Americans!) and some over grown asparagus and herbs that went to seed. (Also threw in a handful and a bit of shell grit for good measure!) and They went MAD for it

 

[Red-Stars-in-RI]

Some of that produce is better than what I bought fresh today.

Some looks pretty good, some less so.

I'd be lying if I didn't admit I once turned a load of apples I picked up into cider before feeding them to the chickens.

 

[Red-Stars-in-RI]

Lovely fresh stuff there! On that note……. How much fruit scraps can you give chickens? Is the sugar an issue or is it more just not too much of 1 thing, so much fruit here goes to waste from the orchard I want to give them some but dont want to just dump tons of it on them!

I suppose too much wouldn't be good, but I find they tend to self regulate, especially with the fruit, as it's not their absolute favorite - the greens tend to go first, then melons, and some doesn't get eaten and becomes word food.

 

[MWSIFarm]

I suppose too much wouldn't be good, but I find they tend to self regulate, especially with the fruit, as it's not their absolute favorite - the greens tend to go first, then melons, and some doesn't get eaten and becomes word food.

Yeah the silkies seem really good at pretty much burying what they dont eat! Win win.

 

[Ons3Saam]

G'day mate.

Cheers for the excellent post.

I feed my kitchen scraps to the chooks too. I just don't chop them up that fine. Picking at bigger sized scraps keeps them occupied and stimulated so they don't just sit around.

Have a wonderful day further,
Ons3Saam

 

[Phaedra Geiermann]

For me, it's a lovely morning routine to prepare their brunch, from the ingredients we also have.

For example, yesterday we have some pretty strawberries, and they got the heads with leaves.

Today what I am going to prepare for our meals. Yeah, we love apples.

The outer skin of broccoli stem

Together with other kitchen srcaps from yesterday - again very a sufficient add-on for their feed. It's really quite a lot we can share with them.

Some cooked meat, skin, and organs - those are shared from what we fed our cats and dogs. Although the cats and dogs are raw-fed, I used some meat, bones, and organs to make the broth for them. Chickens always get those cooked animal protein.

Today's Speical!

 

[-Flash-]

I cooked most of the time two to three meals every day, so we always have very sufficient kitchen scraps. I loved to save kitchen scraps for adding into the chicken feed.

Our hens have their commercial feed, and on top of that, I add fermented grains and whatever originally belonged to the compost bins.

Now I am "addicted" to save scraps for them, and it's also a kind of reducing waste. For example, the apples we had this morning - the peels, head and end belong to the chicken; and the cores (apple seeds are slightly toxic) go to the compost.
*However, in this photo, the small bucket in the right side is a temporary residence of black solider fly larvae that just arrived yesterday.
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Homegrown flower sprouts - besides the larger leaves, the hens also got some fair share of the sprouts.
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I used smaller containers or glass jars to collect and store the ingredients.
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So, their breakfasts are always colorful.
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They are healthy and laying very well. Besides the kitchen scraps, they also have quite often meat/organs/eggs in their diet in the winter, when the annual molting and the bad weather come together.
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Only our compost bins are starving - hens become their strongest competitors in the winter time. However, I love such food preparation process.

**potato peels went to the compost, unless when I have time to fry them for a speical treat.
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Wow. You are very committed to feeding your chooks!! I just put my scraps in a bowl and chuck 'em in the pen!

 

[Phaedra Geiermann]

The exchange - ingredients shared from our raw-fed cats and dogs returned them with the fresh eggs, twice a week.

 

[Phaedra Geiermann]

Wow. You are very committed to feeding your chooks!! I just put my scraps in a bowl and chuck 'em in the pen!

No matter which way, the chickens are the winners