new research debunks trad views on nutrition

[Perris]

I have seen that chickens will eat grass seeds while leaving most of the stem behind.

that's a separate and different thing - and obviously something that happens only when there are seeds. The nibbling the blade tops happens first thing after breakfast and again after dinner here, plus more occasional passes during the day.

 

[Molpet]

Hopefully we’ll soon discover why dogs eat the tops of grass from very specific areas first thing in the morning, I suspect they’re hunting Protozoa so will take a bit for my compost worms when they find a good spot.

My dog prefers different species of grass. I'm not sure what they are but it's rougher than bluegrass and has different seeds.

 

[saysfaa]

The grass my dogs ate didn't have seeds. There was grass with seeds also easily available.

I thought they ate it because they felt nauseous. Chamois, at least, I'm less sure about the others - they were earlier when I was less attuned and also farm dogs so they spent all day out with us but not necessarily in sight as much. Chamois was interested in grass only when she showed other signs of nausea like drooling and a difference in her stance and movements.

 

[Perris]

The grass my dogs ate didn't have seeds. There was grass with seeds also easily available.

I thought they ate it because they felt nauseous. Chamois, at least, I'm less sure about the others - they were earlier when I was less attuned and also farm dogs so they spent all day out with us but not necessarily in sight as much. Chamois was interested in grass only when she showed other signs of nausea like drooling and a difference in her stance and movements.

that chimes with folklore here - dogs eat grass to make themselves vomit when they've got an upset tummy.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

that chimes with folklore here - dogs eat grass to make themselves vomit when they've got an upset tummy.

We have the same folklore. I both grew up hearing that, and have observed it in practice more than once

 

[Perris]

but it's clearly inapplicable to chickens, who eat grass for its nutritional value, as discussed with links to relevant papers somewhere back on this thread.

 

[Ital]

Might be more than one reason chickens eat it, the gut and soil biome contain most of the same critters.
My dogs will eat grass tops when there’s dew on the ground and goose poo if I give them worming tablets which is what made me think it’s connected with the composition of their microbiome, this would also tie in with the nausea hypothesis.
The tips of grass when there’s dew on them and goose poo are also the best place to look for protozoa if you’re into that sort of thing, not sure why they hang out there.

 

[MaryJanet]

This comment is rather tangential to diet, but one detail I learned from the vet was that when chickens have a blocked gut, they eat and eat and eat and they eat all sorts of things they wouldn't normally consume. It's because they're trying to get their digestion going but what happens is their digestion is so slow that it sort of backs up and that causes slow or impacted crop.

So when one of the hens starts gobbling all sorts of surprising food and is then uncomfortable in the crop, I worry about what's happening further along her digestive system. Especially if there's not much coming out the other end.

 

[Sally PB]

that chimes with folklore here - dogs eat grass to make themselves vomit when they've got an upset tummy.

All four of our dogs have liked to eat grass. I took a stool sample from one of them to the vet, and she jokingly said, "Is this from Shadow, or a cow?"

Our current dog will grab at blades of grass as we walk by. She doesn't seem to want/need to vomit every day, but she'll eat grass every day.

 

[Shadrach]

I’m not sure that having every item in their diet available at all times is necessarily advantageous if there’s enough variety.

I agree. Everything all the time might be considered optimal feeding. Commercial feed aims for this within a limited range at minimum cost. This is where the bulk of the research has been concentrated.
I also agree that at different life stages and at different levels of health dietary needs change. Commercial feed doesn't account for this well.
This for example.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/th...off-their-usual-feed-when-they-moult.1498056/

If we accept the a chicken is capable of knowing what it needs to eat, which I believe is true, not even based on studies but the fact that chickens have survived in such a wide range of ecologies, at times with little diversity in forage from what one can see and assess is present then it's hard to make a case against the proposition.
Again, what is true is their egg laying capacity will be less than with an optimal diet.
There is also the matter of the different breeds with different egg laying capacities. I wouldn't expect hight production breeds to fare well on the diets of low capacity free rangers or feral groups.
However, medium layers of good heritage like the Black Minorcan for example seem to do reasonably well in their natural environment with no commercial feed and minimum supplements from human sources.

There is a lot to be said for picking a breed that is suitable for the keeping conditions and the environment as the primary considerationrather than what people might recommend as a cute friendly bird they've kept mainly confined and fed on commercial feed. Yet another factor that is unlikely to go down well with many chicken keepers.

What I have found very interesting is how quickly some of the Ex Battery hens I know who had never even seen a blade of grass before adapt to foraging, often in preference to commercial feed. Some of this transition has I don't doubt been learned from watching other non battery hens foraging but the weighting between instinct and learned behaviour isn't clear.