Feeding squirrels to your chickens

[CherMoz]

I was just looking out my window and saw four squirrels cleaning out the bird feeder. Thought I'd check on here to see if anyone has done this. As I am always looking for different things to feed my chickens, I wondered about thinning out the population of the squirrels a little bit. Hmmm The squirrels venture into the pasture the chickens are in. I wonder how long the squirrels will last once the chickens have tasted one...

 

[lookyhereboy]

I was just looking out my window and saw four squirrels cleaning out the bird feeder. Thought I'd check on here to see if anyone has done this. As I am always looking for different things to feed my chickens, I wondered about thinning out the population of the squirrels a little bit. Hmmm The squirrels venture into the pasture the chickens are in. I wonder how long the squirrels will last once the chickens have tasted one...

I still haven't given it a try yet. Got busy starting a new part time job. Keep us posted if you give it a go.

 

[tjcib]

I realize this is a year old, but I am Very excited about feeding squirrel to my chickens. I killed 54 squirrels last year just from my deck... our area is overrun and they need population control.

My girls are gonna have lots of protein! I thought about removing the intestines (not the heart, lungs, etc tho).

 

[CherMoz]

54 squirrels!!! Yes, it definitely sounds like an over population problem. Keep us posted please on how it works for you.

 

[Jose herrera]

I have a flock of 10 hans and 1 rooster and i feed them my venison scraps ans bones when they pick the meat out i remove the bones to keep predators away. I always wondered how squirrels would be for the chickens. I will try it with 1 tomorrow and debone the meat just to be safe im sure the chickens will eat ot regardless i will post in my youtube.

 

[Robonuggets]

I have a flock of 10 hans and 1 rooster and i feed them my venison scraps ans bones when they pick the meat out i remove the bones to keep predators away. I always wondered how squirrels would be for the chickens. I will try it with 1 tomorrow and debone the meat just to be safe im sure the chickens will eat ot regardless i will post in my youtube.

When i go rabbit or squirrel hunting i feed mine the hearts, livers, lungs, and kidneys never received a complaint yet lol

 

[123xyz]

Three years more later, I want to thank everyone for addressing my exact question, which I come at from a different perspective. I have fruit trees and cute red squirrels with fluffy tails (Eastern fox squirrels, I believe). They don't cause trouble burrowing and are pretty funny creatures really.

BUT, they eat way too much fruit, so each year from plum season to persimmon season I savagely murder 20-50 of them. I use their bodies to enrich the wood chips and soil that I used to fill in a swampy area across the creek, but it still seems wasteful not to find someone to eat them. The family's not interested (not even me) and the neighbors aren't about to put up with me having a pig, so I'm thinking about getting chickens just so I have someone to eat my squirrels. Eggs would be a side benefit.

 

[RosemaryDuck]

I know this post is pretty old, but since it's been resurrected I just wanted to point something out just as a precaution.

It's fine to feed meat to your birds, but please make sure you're going over the carcasses and checking them beforehand.

Wild animals are by no means clean, and often times are riddled with ticks, fleas, mites and parasites. Some of these can easily transfer over to your flock.

I would highly recommend freezing anything you're going to feed them beforehand. Freezing will at least kill off most of the insects on the outside. Not sure if it would kill tapeworms/internal parasites.

 

[123xyz]

I know this post is pretty old, but since it's been resurrected I just wanted to point something out just as a precaution.

It's fine to feed meat to your birds, but please make sure you're going over the carcasses and checking them beforehand.

Wild animals are by no means clean, and often times are riddled with ticks, fleas, mites and parasites. Some of these can easily transfer over to your flock.

I would highly recommend freezing anything you're going to feed them beforehand. Freezing will at least kill off most of the insects on the outside. Not sure if it would kill tapeworms/internal parasites.

Oh, I agree. It was my plan to cook them (outdoors) before feeding them to the chickens.

That said, I will say that, in my experience, while deer are disgustingly swarming with ticks and other parasites, coyotes seem to have many fleas, and mice can also have tons of small ticks, the squirrels I trap all look pretty healthy and clean.

There's a large buck that likes to rest where I bury my squirrels. I have to wear insecticide-treated clothes when I go over there or I'll come back with fleas on me.

 

[saysfaa]

I know this post is pretty old, but since it's been resurrected I just wanted to point something out just as a precaution.

It's fine to feed meat to your birds, but please make sure you're going over the carcasses and checking them beforehand.

Wild animals are by no means clean, and often times are riddled with ticks, fleas, mites and parasites. Some of these can easily transfer over to your flock.

I would highly recommend freezing anything you're going to feed them beforehand. Freezing will at least kill off most of the insects on the outside. Not sure if it would kill tapeworms/internal parasites.

Wouldn't the insects be first on the menu for the chickens? Birds would carry parasites that infect the chickens too but do mammals?

I haven't had any carcasses to feed so I haven't looked into the differences but I look for plants crawling with insects so the chickens can hunt them.