planting food for chickens... a little help?

[sydney13]

Come spring time I am going to start growing a lot more foods for my chickens to eat. I was thinking of doing the three sisters method with the corn, peas, and squash, but substituting pumpkins for squash. I plan to set it up based on this diagram that I found on this site
http://www.reneesgarden.com/articles/3sisters.html

My question is, would it work okay if I do pumpkins instead of squash? I really like the enormous heirloom pumpkin types, ive seen some for sale that are supposed to average around 500 lbs.

If I grew these giant pumpkins would I to space them out more than the way they do it when they use squash?

 

[oberhaslikid]

Pumpkins take a lot of room and food.If your going for the 500 lber I think I would do them by their self.
I grew the Mammouth Sunflowers and the Nantucket Pumpkin last year for my chickens
They just finished the last one last week.

 

[franklinstreetwest]

Great thoughts. Are your intentions for the three sisters method to feed your birds with the three crops?

 

[sydney13]

Quote:
yes, I was hoping to also grow some other grains (wheat, oats and sorghums) and mix that in with their corn to make my own feed for them. The pumpkins would be to give them a treat mostly in the winter and the beans would also be for them (if they like them).

 

[Moabite]

Pumpkins are squash. You can also plant sunflowers in with the corn. I did this last year and the chickens got the most out of it, but I planted 5 kinds of squash, 3 kinds of corn and pole beans in a 8 by 12' area. Corn didn't turn out well do to pollination, but I'm still learning.

 

[classicsredone]

I'm doing sunflowers along one fenceline, and three sisters near our shed. I picked sweetie pie pumpkins because they don't eat up as much in terms of water and nutrients. I'd do as suggested and put big pumpkins somewhere else. The big pumpkins are usually coddled like crazy, and growers only allow one pumpkin per vine to grow to maturity.

Since it is cold out, I've planted things like peas, kale, and collards for them to munch on.

 

[GhostRider65]

I also want to plant a chicken garden.
I bought Chicweed seeds, mangle beets, kale, greens, swisschard, amaranth, cabbage, German chamomile, sorgum, and corn of course, thats planted in my big garden, along with squash, melons tomatoes, ect. and they get all the weeds pulled this year. hehe
I put up a post somewhere will have to add the link here I guess.

heres that other thread link https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=461653