Vegetarian Chickens?

[canada-goose]

No chicken is truly vegetarian~they love bugs! Worms are a favorite. Sometimes chickens will eat slugs. Vegetarian chickens~*snort*

 

[cmom]

I have been enjoying this thread immensely.

Quote:
I sell my eggs as fresh eggs, as they are. Most of my customers could give a hoot about my birds being vegetarians. I have one regular customer who buys my eggs to feed them to her dog. People who buy fresh eggs rarely ask what I feed my birds. I give my customers tours of my coops and show them the birds to let them see how they live. I do care about my birds nutrition.

 

[Davaroo]

Quote:
This is a good point. You would have to rigidly control their total environment to ensure vegetarian feeding. One bug, one fly, one microscopic tidbit of insectivorous life and - poof! - there goes the vegan chicken - right out the proverbial window.

 

[dlhunicorn]

*shakes head*
(ditto the *snort* remark)

 

[AHappychick]

Quote:
I agree I use organic feed and dont want all the by-products but I know my chooks do better with meat in their system. I always laugh at that, better for them fo say chickens fed no by-products and low grade meats than make them vegitarian. All that soy is not good for them anyway.

 

[DiVon80]

Quote:
BUT! Then they are loading up the food w soy. Chickens need the protien and soy is not a complete protein. its really bad for you. Also a lot of vegi people eat soy products. If you research soy it was produced as a crop that got plowed under to improve soil conditions or fed to the pigs. Not a good thing. We had vegi people try to get their pet dogs on a diet of no meat-I was working w a vet who was treating the dogs they had all kinds of nutritional issues. Why do people try to change what a species does for a living.

 

[OrpingtonManor]

I wanted to post on the subject of BSE, which was touched on a few pages back.

My son is just finishing his doctorate in protein folding at the University of Washington. His lab does research on BSE, CJD, chronic wasting disease in elk, etc. We had a conversation the other day on the subject of bone meal as it relates to chickens. He said they have been unable to find a single incidence of chickens getting a prion disease. They seem remarkably resilient in this regard. Using bone meal will not give your chickens BSE.

 

[hikerchick]

Quote:
does it transfer to the eggs, though?

 

[ivan3]

If I were Vegan, I'd have to stick with the eggs from frugivorous parrots (only way to be absolutely sure).

Even if feeding chooks an elemental diet from nonanimal sources there'd always be a chance that some wandering roach might be plucked from the bars of some cage or other by those omnivorous chickens.

Once past the gizzard the `source' becomes irrelevant:

https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=215172
(eggs marketed as `herpan'?)

 

[OrpingtonManor]

Quote:
does it transfer to the eggs, though?

I'll ask him. I'll also ask for a link to any study on it.