What do you feed your chickens?

[JessMay]

Our chickens eat their layer pellets, cracked corn, watermelon, corn cobs, lettuce, broccoli stems, peas, green beans, blueberries, cherries, dandelion leaves, plantains, grapes(frozen grapes are good in the summer). What kind of chickens do you have?

Haven’t tried a lot of these... we have barred rocks, hyline browns, one white araucana, buff oppingtons, Golden pheonix, one crossbreed (we think buff Orpington cross) and a black copper murane rooster.

 

[want2know]

I feed mine cracked corn every morning when its cold, and sometimes in the evening if it is really cold at night, but cracked corn is NOT good for them in the summer when it is hot. In the summer afternoons when it is hottest, I chop up frozen peaches, or grapes or blueberries. I give them one big hunk of frozen watermelon, frozen corn, corn on the cob is a big favorite, frozen peas, chopped tomato, any kind of chopped lettuc, celery leaves, left over scrambled eggs, chopped hard boiled egg, chopped cucumber, (the seeds are good for worming), carrot peels. In the winter, I switch it up with left over cold cooked rice, bread heals crumbled, corn tortillas crumbs, cooked oatmeal with a little bit of raisins.
Always a generous supply of grit and oyster shell. I have 6 different breeds, and never had a sick chicken, and they all look great and are good layers. However, everything in moderation. I usually never "treat" more than what will cover the bottom of a pie pan with one layer, usually once a day, for 5 hens and a roo.

 

[Dr Duck]

Chickens are omnivores so they can eat just about anything. I feed mine all the scraps from the table. When the bucket I put the scraps in is full I just dump it in the Yard and its gone in a few minutes.

 

[igorsMistress]

I feed a pelleted all flock, available dry at all times but I ferment enough to feed twice per day. I also give them some form of animal protein every day, either worms, cooked meat or hard boiled eggs with their morning scratch. Scratch is mixed just a handful for 12 birds with the same amount of protein and then their pellets.

Treats are primarily greens and herbs stuffed in a suet cage daily. A few times a week they'll get squash, pumpkin, cucumber, melon, berries, whatever I have on hand.

ETA I don't feed my flock bread or noodles, and nothing from our table because they don't need the salt, pepper, onions etc. They do get rice once in a great while, and they like warm oatmeal on a cold morning. A handful of oats, a handful of pigeon feed and some dehydrated worms, pour hot water on it and let cool a bit, they go to town!

 

[Libby2019]

Mine really enjoy cucumber and watermelon. I also give them some mealworms, oats and sunflower seeds.

 

[RoosterML]

Leftover shrimp and they get the rest of my T-bone steak when I am done. They do a better job of cleaning off the bone than I ever could.

 

[Azmomm]

I live in the desert and right now the prickly pear fruit are ripening all over. The chickens love them. I pick the really red ripe ones, shake them in a pan with some sand to knock the main prickles off and they go crazy

 

[onvirginiasoil]

What kinds of fruits and veggies do you feed your chickens? So far we’ve found they love green beans, strawberries and zucchini. What are other good things to feed them?

 

[onvirginiasoil]

What kinds of fruits and veggies do you feed your chickens? So far we’ve found they love green beans, strawberries and zucchini. What are other good things to feed them?

JessMay, I take it you don't have a garden. If there is a small independent resource (a veggie "stand") in your area, make friends with someone who works there. Veggies and fruits regularly "go bad" but not really: they're edible, but they are no longer pretty enough to sell. Chickens couldn't care less. And the owners will sometimes give them away.

Would that grocery stores could give away such produce, but the rules governing them are stricter than for roadside stands, and they destroy the produce instead. The stands may be preferable anyway because their food is local.

But I can't think of anything at such stands that chickens don't like. I feed them such when in season. In winter, the stands close and my gardens play out, so my chickens get such treats more erratically, depending on what I am buying for myself.

So although I generally feed my chickens layer feed plus scratch for a treat, their diet is seasonal. When they are molting. I switch to game bird feed because it is higher in protein. To withstand the cold, think higher protein and carbohydrates (scratch). But summer is another matter entirely, and the summer this year has been hard on my chickens. Their regular feed and scratch produce heat inside them, and they don't want to eat these. They free-range during the day, but I see them seeking shade a lot. They're not laying much anyway because of the heat, so we're temporarily in survival mode, and I concentrate on fresh veggies and fruits chopped up finely and frozen. Electrolytes are good too in the heat. I don't mix an electrolyte by recipe, but I do put a little salt in their water and give them bananas and raisins (both high in potassium) mixed with yogurt. Frequently I freeze this mix with whatever veggie scraps I have. (And by the way, yogurt retains its probiotic characteristics even after being frozen. I regularly buy large quantities of yogurt for myself and put it in the freezer until I'm ready to eat it.)

As for particular veggies and fruits, though, I suspect they'll like all of it. Those with seeds will serve a dual purpose of helping ward off internal parasites, so if that's a concern, look for those. Mine adore bananas, so I buy them when they are on the bargain table at the grocery store. I frequently mash them with some high-protein game-bird feed (a little goes a long way) and mix all of it with other veggies and fruits and put the mix in the freezer during sweltering weather. Let it thaw a little and then watch it disappear.

 

[mountainchickens]

Our chickens absolutely love bananas, grapes, peas and corn. They're picky about which weeds or greens they eat, but they like some of them. We freeze small peas and bits of corn into ice cubes in hot weather, then let them thaw to a slushy consistency. The chickens go crazy for it!