FREE food for my chickens!

[chookchick]

I'm a landscaper, and I would be very nervous about getting any clippings from a landscaping company. Anyone who is willing to pay someone to mow their lawn (especially in this economy), is going to be picky enough about their lawn to have it sprayed for weeds, fertilized with chemicals, etc...Landscapers love to do this stuff because it is good money, and not too hard work. I use only corn gluten meal on my lawn, but I am an exception. Finding a place that can give you old produce is your best bet. Weeds are also good if they don't use chemicals--my chickens love them better than lettuce! If your neighbors have gardens with unpicked cabbage etc... that have gotten wormy that is a great find.

 

[domino7]

I'm a landscaper as well, but many of my customers do not treat their lawn. They're older people who can't cut their own grass. My chickens have no interest in the clippings I bring home though. They don't even scratch through it.

 

[rirluvr]

I hope I never run out of food for my girls. I do hear they are also carnivores though. I don't know how many chickens you have but if you are swimming in chickens you might want to start sacrificing some for the good of the flock and feeding them ground chicken burgers. If you have an issue with that then kill other vermin.

 

[Ariel301]

Some of the large chain grocery stores won't give away or even sell the bad produce/bread that they are going to throw away, the corporate policy is that it MUST be destroyed and not even employees can take it. I've run across that issue before when trying to get scraps to feed my goats.

My college roommate worked at a non-grocery that had this same policy, and when we moved once, they would not even let us get cardboard boxes! They would throw them into an incinerator as soon as they were empty, so that no one could take them! Any damaged or unsalable merchandise would be smashed to uselessness and then thrown out so that no one could get it out of the trash and take it home. Part of my roommate's job was to make sure that anything that could not be sold was destroyed to the point that it could not be used. They would not even let her buy damaged items at a discounted price when she offered. I think that's pretty ridiculous!

It's a great idea though, if you can get safe to feed scraps for free or trade. The locally owned grocery stores here donate all their non-sellable produce and bread to a homeless shelter, so there's none available to get for my livestock. I'm still trying to convince my chickens that kitchen scraps really are food...I think they did not get anything to eat but scratch feed before I got them, so that is all they want.

The biggest issue with the grass clippings, aside from whether the lawn was sprayed with pesticides and fertilizer, is not with the moving process. The tractors used to mow hay also run on gas just like a mower, and that is obviously safe. The issue with animals like horses or goats is that if they are not used to grazing on green grass, the clippings are very rich and overeating on it can make them very sick. Also, there might be bits of trash or metal/wire in there that the animals could ingest. I've fed lawn clippings to all sorts of animals before, and it works ok if you just be careful. Check it over for trash, and don't let them overeat fresh green grass. If you're looking for something like that to entertain them, you might also ask feed stores that sell hay if they would give you some of the hay scraps that build up on the ground around the bales. My chickens love sorting through my goats' hay leftovers.

 

[helloroe]

I cut two of my neighbor's yards along with ours for the yard clippings. They are older so it helps them as well When I back the mower with bagger up to their run they get excited and get right to work foraging through the piles of clippings eating and making nests.