Sheesh! is this toxic plant list for real???

[socks]

o.k. in the interest of protecting my young flock I started searching poisonous plants ....amongst other things I found various opinions on whether chickens knew enough not to eat too much of various things like buttercup etc. But then someone submitted this link made specifically for poultry
http://www.poultryhelp.com/toxicplants.html

The list is humungous and stuff that I have been feeding my little critters (6 weeks old) like kale are listed as toxic. Now I only started with kale because people have suggested this. and I know it to be nutritious. Kale is said to be goitergenic (spelling?) which when i checked said it suppresses the goiter but then so do any other brassicas and strawberries etc. (like a ton of stuff we all eat). So are chickens particularly susceptible to goiter problems??? or is this list just a little on the overkill side. Seriously, if this list is to be followed then i won't be free ranging them and I will hardly be giving them anything from my garden or table scraps

(starting to wonder if the list was compiled by someone who sells chicken feed) ......not making sense, your wisdom needed for this newbie.

 

[Wifezilla]

I vote paranoid.

Heck, my freaking drake has been caught eating foam packing peanuts on more than occasion. I don't think a little kale is going to kill him.

 

[speckledhen]

Birds instinctively know what is bad for them, as far as plants go. I couldnt even identify all the plants on my woodsy property that might be on that list, so I trust the birds not to consume what is poisonous to them. You'd go crazy trying to chicken-proof acreage!

 

[azelgin]

Quote:
I vote paranoid too. Vinca is supposed to be an hallucinogen. how can I tell if my chickens are hallucinating?

 

[gritsar]

Quote:
I agree. We have lots of things on this farm that I know for a fact are poisonous, yet I don't have dead chickens, so.....

 

[Preservation Acres]

They had my interest until they listed cabbage. Definitely paranoid.

 

[saddina]

To do toxicity studies they feed nothing but the offending plant and note effects. Plenty of things are toxic if you eat 5 lbs of them, but are things you'd never actually eat 5 lbs of to begin with.

 

[WriterofWords]

Quote:
Exactly! It's like the lists of everything that causes cancer,, well duh! If I were a 9 oz rat and ate 100 lbs of poison over a month I think I might get cancer too!

 

[danielbrown]

I say ignore that list. Almost everything my chickens eat is on it.
Clover

Chickweed

Fescue(grass)

 

[digitS']

I've expressed my dismay about this list on poultryhelp.com before. The list is from a book on reptile keeping. That, in itself, is not a disqualification for information on plants toxic to chickens. Generally, a plant toxic to one animal is likely to be toxic to other animals. However, there's no explanation why some common livestock forage plants are on this list.

Probably any plant may become toxic if grown conditions like drought, flooding, over-fertilization, and such. For people who keep grazing animals, even slightly toxic forage can be bad news.

Not all that long ago I came across a Canadian government website on toxic plants. Many of these plants are found on both sides of the border.

Once again, the folks supplying the information are trying to "cover the bases" and help farmers stay out of trouble. But, they do provide references, examples of poisonings, etc. They also provide some common sense, like these words on brassicas:

"Brassica oleracea includes common cultivated crops such as kale, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, and cabbage. All these vegetables are capable of forming toxic quantities of SMCO, a chemical that can cause hemolytic anemia in livestock. These plants also contain glucosinolates, which can cause goiter. In general, these widely used vegetables are safe for human consumption. Cases of livestock poisoning occur when they are used almost exclusively as fodder for animals (Kingsbury 1964, Smith 1980, Cheeke and Schull 1985, Benevenga et al. 1989)."

The message is fairly clear: don't feed these plants and exclude other foods from your animals' diets.

Steve