Okay, how about cherries?

[David Stratton]

We have a pie cherry tree that produces a LOT of cherries. I picked some off the ground and gave them to the girls. I figured they would do like the Robins and pick off the flesh from the pits. I saw at least one of them toss down the whole thing. Mind you these are not giant sweet cherries but the smaller tart pie variety, maybe 5/8" in diameter. Relatively speaking the pits seem like they might be a bit much for a chicken since I seriously doubt they will be digested and will probably have to pass the digestive system whole. What do you think do they get cherries or not. By the way, I am not about to pit cherries for the chickens. David

 

[dsqard]

How big are the pits? I would only worry that they might wind up with a bunch in their crop and then they would get impacted.

 

[hessjero]

my girls eat cherries whole, just the size you describe, every year and haven't had any trouble

 

[woodmort]

I have a black cherry tree in the corner of my chicken yard--the cherries, with pits, are the size of a good-sized pea. When they get ripe the chickens stand under there and wait for the fruit to fall so they can scarf it down whole--been there for 25 year and, thus far, haven't lost a chicken to cherry pitted impacted crop.

 

[Whimsy]

I fed mine cherries from our pie cherry tree and they just passed the pits. They loved them. Oh a word of advice...(DO NOT feed cherries to your chickens in sandals after getting a pedicure with cherry red polish) well unless you are very good at doing a jig tryiong to keep your toes safe. My DH laughed so hard at me