What are your flocks favorite treats?

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Mine go nuts for foods like corn, bread, meat, peas, rice, seeds and melon. Like drumstick diva said, make sure that treats only take up 10% of their daily feed ration though.
 
I agree with the others that most treats are an acquired taste for them and they usually need to be offered something a few times to like it, but two treats mine immediately took to are plain yogurt and scrambled egg -- both good for them. Once they decided chard isn't scary that's also a fave. I grow it in pots and rotate them so it can regenerate before they destroy it.
 
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Has anyone here ever owned silkies? These are my first silkies (despite wanting them for over 10 years). I'd read that because they're so much smaller than the rest of the flock that they get picked on so I've kept a close eye on them. But it seems to be the opposite, at least in my flock. They won't bother jumping in the fray for treats but wait on the sidelines to steal a treat from someone. The bigger ones won't willingly give the treats up but as soon as one of the silkies has it, they let them have it. They don't do that for each other, only the silkies. And I went to bring the silkies inside last night (because it was colder than usual) to find that the bigger girls had pig piled under the heat lamp with the silkies in the middle. Usually they sleep on top of the nesting box but the silkies are too small to get up there on their own yet and I come out and lift them up there before I head to bed so they can sleep with everyone. Is it unusual for a flock to give the smaller ones special treatment like this? Mind you, they are all the same age. These are not adult hens taking chicks under their wing.
 
blackrose211 said:
Has anyone here ever owned silkies? These are my first silkies (despite wanting them for over 10 years). I'd read that because they're so much smaller than the rest of the flock that they get picked on so I've kept a close eye on them. But it seems to be the opposite, at least in my flock. They won't bother jumping in the fray for treats but wait on the sidelines to steal a treat from someone. The bigger ones won't willingly give the treats up but as soon as one of the silkies has it, they let them have it. They don't do that for each other, only the silkies. And I went to bring the silkies inside last night (because it was colder than usual) to find that the bigger girls had pig piled under the heat lamp with the silkies in the middle. Usually they sleep on top of the nesting box but the silkies are too small to get up there on their own yet and I come out and lift them up there before I head to bed so they can sleep with everyone. Is it unusual for a flock to give the smaller ones special treatment like this? Mind you, they are all the same age. These are not adult hens taking chicks under their wing.
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In my experience, size matters more in younger birds.
 
@blackrose211 In my experience the pecking order of chickens is ruthless. I hope you don't but I would expect given time you will find chickens are not nice to new birds or young birds until they learn their place. I just got my first six silkies and plan on building them a large chicken tractor coop and keep them separate from my existing flock.

I've even witnessed a new roo being introduced to a all hen flock, he got
beat up for awhile.
 
These aren't new chicks I'm introducing. This flock is completely from scratch, no previous adults at all. A bobcat killed every single chicken in my last flock. So these chicks are all the same age, but the silkies are the only bantams so the other chickens are at least twice their size. They decided their pecking order weeks ago. What's weird is that the larger sized birds are NOT picking on the silkies. They are all watching out for them.
 

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