Free ranging and lawn fertilizer question

[Club cramahe coop]

hello everyone.
We are keeping 11 girls this year for the first time. We have built a nice coop with a covered run with wood chips on the floor. They spend most of their time in there for now. Each evening ,when we get home , and all day on weekends we let them out to free range in a large area we have with an electric poultry net around. This has worked well but the lawn in this area is in the trees and has never been lush with grass. I wanted to let them into the rest of the lawn today , or maybe the vegetable garden area for a treat. My wife reminded me that I applied lawn fertilizer several weeks ago to those areas. We have had lots of rain to wash away and dissolve lots of the fertilizer. Is it a goo idea to let them free range in these areas? Will any residual fertilizer hurt them ?

 

[Folly's place]

Welcome!
Fertilizer when dissolved into the lawn is fine, any herbicides or pesticides are not. It's a choice, and the 'green grass monoculture' isn't so good if you have chickens.
It depends on what you used, and what the package says, the MSDS, all that.
Here we don't apply herbicides at all.
Mary

 

[Club cramahe coop]

We never use herbicides and pesticides. This was just fall fertilizer from the farm feed store.

 

[Folly's place]

So it should be fine. You don't want them eating those fertilizer pellets, but they're all gone by now, right?
Mary

 

[Perris]

if you do let them roam, they will fertilize your lawn as they go
they will also scarify , and remove meadow ants, may bugs, crane flies etc.
my lawn has never looked better since I've had chickens patrolling it