Mimosa seed

[hillbillyhebrew]

I have mimosa trees and right now they are loaded with the green pods, Was wondering if the chickens can eat them! Also wondering if the seeds were store-able for winter chicken snacks. If someone still wants seeds to plant let me know.

 

[Chipper Chicken]

If by Mimosa you mean this tree

It's Latin name is Albizia julibrissin, also known as the Silk tree, (although it does not produce silk).

I've read a couple blogs that suggest the "peas" green stage only, MAY be edible. I would not feed more than a few and see if there are any negative side effects. This is just smart to do on any new food source you're not sure of. Wait several hours, even overnight, if no problems try a few more.

As these blogs emphasized the green shelled peas from the pods, not brown (said were hard as a rock when they're brown), I don't think you could save them, (unless maybe you could freeze them). But do a google search yourself and see what you can find. If this is the same tree you're talking about, just make sure you use the Latin name in your search or you may get an acacia tree reference instead.

Another source suggested the young leaves may help color up the yolk of hens eggs. I don't think it said what color though. And also certain other livestock like goats could eat the young leaves too.

Whether it is edible or not versus poisonous seems not widely studied, at least from the quick search I did, maybe you'll have better luck if you spend some time "digging" good luck.

They are a beautiful tree, I am enjoying the hummingbirds getting nectar from the flowers on our tree.

 

[hillbillyhebrew]

Thanks Much! Yes Exactly the tree I'm talking about and I never knew the Latin Name. I actually threw a few pods in today to see what they would do with them and so far not much. They had already had fresh tender field corn A huge bunch of chickweed straight from the garden and their regular daily feed so they were not to hungry. They're 22 light Brahma hens and 3 roosters so they eat a lot and I'm looking for every source of natural but healthy feed for them. They only free range a couple of hours in the late afternoon when we can watch for predators. But we throw them clover, all kinds of weeds,veggie scraps from the garden and kitchen that keeps them happy in their yard. All summer we've been feeding them Japanese beetles that we picked off flowers and our pole beans. The hens actually started laying in July and from what everyone said about Brahmas this is at least a month and a half early! We have taken exceptionally good care of them though. Again thanks for the info. Does help much!

 

[Chipper Chicken]

That's great, glad I could help. The blogs I read did say to shell them, and incidentally at least one person reported they caused bad breath. They ate them in tortillas.
Have you looked at sprouted grain for feeding your chickens? There is a thread here on BYC called "Growing fodder for chickens" that I've been following that explains it better than I can. I did start several jars worth a few days ago just for our use. I also followed a link to this website that detailed all the benefits of the individual seeds/grains/legumes. One thing to note where I disagree with the natures wonderland website is they said wheat has to be sprouted in soil, which is not true. I sprouted both hard red and hard white and they did fine in the jars. Anyway here's the website for that...
http://www.natureswonderland.com.au/articles/sprouting-seeds/

But do check out the thread growing fodder for chickens, it will really give you some ideas on how to stretch your feed, and you can use a lot of wild seeds too that maybe you can collect yourself before fall.