Gardening and Chickens

[cyrixlord]

Hi!

Right now, nothing is in the ground and the girls have been helping me in the garden loosen the clods I made with shovels and tillers. Now they have to leave the garden. I put up fencing that comes out in sections so all I have to do is lift the section of fence I want out and walk into my garden and put the fence up behind me. The girls have the whole back yard they can play in while im in the garden.

For my hostas and flower beds in the back yard, I fenced them with 2 foot high welded wire green fencing. Last year the chickens kicking of the mulch from my flower beds killed my grass.

Here is my garden to the left, with the rest for the chickens to free range in while im outside.

for strawberries, I plant them so half the plant is inside the fence, and half outside for the girls. That way the strawberries constantly regenerate berries for them as they are picked, and of course I get to keep some for myself on the other side of the fence!

 

[TammyTX]

I have a raised bed garden but the neighbor's guineas still would dust bathe in them, until....I put a life-like 3 ft long rubber snake draped over the side! Scared the crows off my peppers too!

.....I hate crows, the eat my purple martin babies....

 

[HiDelight]

OFF topic...OK my 2 cents.. we need a section to talk about this and combine all the garden threads! ..everytime I look at this board there is another gardening topic someplace else ..in fact I almost posted the same thoughts in the same thread twice!

I am a cyber dork
I am not sure where to post on gardening topics it is very confusing with the trheads all over! ...and really I dont want to and will not flip back and forth between boards to talk about chickens and gardening ..I joined the other board but already am on overload and probably will not be using it ..the subject is worthy of a section and I am not sure why it wouldn't be?

so for now when I see a thread pop up I guess I can just join in and hope I can follow the many threads spread out here

but would it not be neater to just have a spot for poultry and gardens since there are so many threads? just my opinion for what is is worth

and hope for a poultry/garden section of its own here until then

back On topic! as far as keeping the birds from demolishing the garden why not mini tractors ..like the dog crate idea but with out a bottom on them?

I am very excited to post that my sweet husband hit the box store for his plumbing supplies for my new kitchen and his shop bathroom and I am doing a happy dance because he also purchsed everything he needs to make me a couple of chicken tractors! he is using pvc pipe and chicken wire ..I think he plans on making two or three ...not sure..however because the genious is at work

I do know I requested he make a large one and one small one ..there are areas of my garden where I want the hens to focus their energy and hopefully this will be chicken garden synergy when he is done with this project

I am very excited about chicken tractors! (wow I never would have thought I would read myself typing that news!!!)

my friends father grows a lot of corn when it reaches a good size he lets his chickens do all the work between the rows..he swears by chickens and gardens being a perfect combo as long as you protect your baby plants...he also says they are wonderful at keeping the blackberry shoots down (something we need in Western WA that is for sure) .. since I do mostly squarefoot gardening I am going to just have one tractor that will fight directly over the beds to contain them so they do not eat everything in the garden!

now if I could just train my dog to pull a garden cart with tools, vegetables ect, up and down my hill .. I would be totally hooked up!!! ...we are working on him and pulling ...but no carts until 2 years old so he can get some mass on him first ..so this year I am going to just put a harness and small weight on and have him follow me .....then next year he can pull a cart around!

Happy Gardening I am off tomorrow but am thinking the weather is still going to be lousy so probably no gardening

 

[bayouchica]

Hi, I have over 100 free ranging chickens, this is what has worked for us.
This is where my vining plants are going to be.I do the same with my tomatoes & bell peppers.For squash,we just use cages.

I have scarlet runners on the right & aparagus yardlongs on the left.
We just took some fencing & made hoops & then put chicken wire on the ends.

Good luck & happy gardening, Miriam

 

[vermontgal]

Thanks for the pics bayouchica - in my climate those hoops would also have plastic covers on them to turn them into mini-greenhouses! (I am planning to make something like that myself this weekend, but there is still about a foot of snow on my raised beds.

 

[kees]

Quote:
Thanks for the link to The Easy Garden! Now they have one more member!

Suzy

 

[dospuercos]

Quote:
I am not so sure about how this will work. Maybe I'm envisioning something different than you have in mind. I just know I have tried this with my pot-bellied pigs (not as bug eaters/weeders), just so they won't eat my plants. And even though they can't get tangled around each other, the chickens might get themselves tangled around your plants & damage them. Chickens are not that bright & won't be able to back-track the same way they came in. If all they are going to have access to on their leashes is right in front of the plants, then you might as well install a fence & not have to worry about getting them in & out of the garden if the phone rings or you need to run inside to get a drink, etc.

 

[jonesgirl]

My chickens eat anything green. Last year afte I lost most of my garden to pesky chipmunks, I let the chickens into the garden... Thy do make good cleaner uppers... THey had the corn stalks down by fall! They thought I was the best mom when they realized what they had thier beaks on :}


On a serious note.. How concerned should we be is we do let the chickens in the garden, with salmonella? (sp?)