What do you grow for your chickens?

[DmCrawlz]

What plants have you noticed that your chickens love to eat? I have a large yard and I am continuously looking for new plants to add. I try to get either edibles, herbs (to place in their coop/nesting boxes) or plants that the chickens eat...as it all ends up in the coop when I cut it back anyways...

So far, they love cabbage, ice plants, wandering jew, berries off the Malabar Spinach plants, broccoli leaves and any vege with seeds (cantaloupe, pumpkin...)

 

[lazy gardener]

They eat anything I don't want them to eat! And what they don't eat, they totally shred with their digging. Then, they disperse the mulch throughout the lawn. I've given up on flower gardens. I now have weed gardens.

 

[DmCrawlz]

I have my yard and garden separate from the girls and I just throw trimmings in the run. I know they'll eat any kind of edibles and either eat or dig the roots up on anything else, as they do escape once in awhile! I'm just trying to find new plants for my landscape that would make a good edition to a chicken diet!

 

[MeepBeep]

We don't really grow anything for them, but they get any excess garden stuff and all the left overs...

 

[cavemanrich]

Dill is one plant they will keal for ( I don't like using the real word.) We have to grow it in containers for our use, placed high and out of sight. When it was in the garden, we never got to eat a strand. When we chop dill for our recipes, we usually do not use the stems. I chop the stems and give to the girls. It is a feeding frenzy like sharks in blood laced water.

I just thought to add this link from BYC about eatible weeds.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/...site&utm_source=sendgrid.com&utm_medium=email

 

[shortgrass]

Mine seem to hunt out Wonder berries, radish pods, and of course, tomatoes, beans, squash, watermelons, beet greens, lettuce.....

I actually grow a few herbs and flowers specifically for them, their own herb garden...Wormwood, comfrey, nettles, borage, nasturtium, blue flax, anise, and cornflowers just to name a few lol...

I use cover crops for winter, winter peas, winter rye, wheat etc...and clovers, vetch, trefoil, cowpeas, oatgrass in spring etc...

We raise corn, wheat, and alfalfa too...always something for them to munch

 

[ChippieChicken]

My girls love kale and broccoli and cauliflower, but they prefer to pick it off the plant. (They'll eat trimmings, if they have to, but it's not the same.) So I have some dino kale growing right outside the run, for the BRs who like to escape. Perhaps we'll try some inside the run this winter, if I can find a way to make sure they don't get destroyed the first chance the chickens get at them.

They also stripped the grapes I was growing in the run of their leaves and bounced up and down on the branches. Definitely need taller fencing for those until they have a chance to really get going. They will jump for maple leaves and flowers, which is very amusing to watch. The rosemary they nap in is starting to flower out, and the Ameraucanas in particular like to snack on those. Mustard is also a dual-purpose (snack and springboard) favorite.

Started growing a few fig and plum trees in the run, hoping that they will provide some shade when they start taking off. With the added bonus for the chickens of getting any fruit that falls.

Cucs and zucchs, strawberries and cantaloupe round out their faves from our garden, and the older scobies from our kombucha are a special treat, though those things have to be brought to them. They also love any grasshoppers we can collect and let loose in their run. Mmm, chapulines. . . .

I'm going to have to try dill next after reading the comments! I also read chicory was good for their digestive track?

 

[kerusnak]

I don't know if this counts but I sprout lentils for them, it is one of their favorite treats!

 

[cavemanrich]

I read on a different thread ,, that person made raised bed type of enclosures. Covered tops with wire netting. Chickens were only able to eat what grew above the netting. This resulted the plants to keep growing and producing.. Chickens were not able to scratch the plants to death.

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

Leaf lettuce, tomatoes, grapes, cucumbers, apples, strawberries, raspberry, pumpkin, squash, zucchini, watermelon, cantaloupe, just to name a few. Don't grow them entirely for the chickens but they get their fair share.