Things I don't feed my chickens😊

[EddieSalita]

Onion is fine. Some people notice that it causes a taste in the eggs however if too much is eaten. My chooks won't eat it on its own however.

Onion extracts can improve bone health in fact.

It's good to include sources for some information. Or at least do so,e cursory fact checking. To prevent urban myths taking hold.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/ar...extracts can,and strength in broiler chickens.

My chooks live with various citrus trees. The most I've noticed is the picking the seeds out of fallen rotten fruit. Otherwise they don't eat it.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

Everybody Knows is almost certainly assurance that they don't, particularly in the internet age. As @Perris said above, sources please.

"The Internet" is not a source. Its a trash pile that requires careful digging into, preferably with personal protective devices installed (firewall, anti-virus, spam filter, etc).

The one thing that we can likely all agree on is the 500-ish year old adage,"the dosage is the poison". Almost everything which is safe to (or even necessary for) living creatures in moderation is dangerous at high enough dosage, including those deadly but ubiquitous substances water, salt, and oxygen.

 

[BDutch]

Hello! Please do not feed these foods to your flock! These items can be toxic or be deadly to your babies.

Avocado skin or pit! (toxic)
apple seeds
chocolate and candy
onions and garlic
rhubarb leaves
raw potato
rotten food
ANY CITRUS!!!
coffee grounds
Raw Beans


Hope this helped!

My chickens love to eat lightly rotten apples and other fruit.
They know what to eat and what not.
They eat the inside of a avocado with brown spots, but leave the peel for me to throw away.

Just never give them anything hazardous without acces to any other food like chicken crumble.

 

[NorthwoodsChick]

"The Internet" is not a source. Its a trash pile

Forgive me for cutting your quote short. One must always consider the source. “Garbage in yields garbage out”-excellent food for thought.

ANY CITRUS!!!

This is called generalizing misinformation.
Animal health researches have been studying the impact of standardized citrus extract on broiler gut health and growth in Europe for a while.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10032183/

I get that people want to be helpful when offering advice on BYC. We all need to carefully consider the source of information.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

My chickens love to eat lightly rotten apples and other fruit.
They know what to eat and what not.
They eat the inside of a avocado with brown spots, but leave the peel for me to throw away.

Just never give them anything hazardous without acces to any other food like chicken crumble.

^^^ there is wisdom in this. Chickens with choices will generally NOT eat something to excess which is dangerous to them in the near term.

They might nibble - they explore the world with their beaks after all - but for most things they will not consume to excess where superior alternatives are available. Which is why my chickens ignore the bracken fern, topical soda apples, and a half dozen other things that grow wild in my pasture and resist all efforts to eradicate. They even eat certain other greens seasonally - avoiding it in periods when it tends to concentrate certain harmful substances late in season. [source: Anecdotal experience - feel free to disregard]

Many other grazing animals do the same. Good thing, as I also have goats. Who will eat (almost) anything.

 

[Shadrach]

My chickens currently eat rubbarb leaves, apple pips, bread, rotting vegetables, garlic, avacado pulp and that's just the stuff I know about.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

... They even eat certain other greens seasonally - avoiding it in periods when it tends to concentrate certain harmful substances late in season. [source: Anecdotal experience - feel free to disregard]

Many other grazing animals do the same. Good thing, as I also have goats. Who will eat (almost) anything.

Others, sharing similar experiences.

University of Delaware
Oregon State University
Penn State
UM
etc.

 

[MysteryChicken]

Hello! Please do not feed these foods to your flock! These items can be toxic or be deadly to your babies.

Avocado skin or pit! (toxic)
apple seeds
chocolate and candy
onions and garlic
rhubarb leaves
raw potato
rotten food
ANY CITRUS!!!
coffee grounds
Raw Beans


Hope this helped!

Mine get apple cores with seeds. No harm done.
They got lots of it over the past couple years, none dropped dead.

Citrus is perfectly fine to feed chickens.


I do avoid giving the rest that's on the list to the birds.

 

[SandyRiverChick]

Woke up this morning to find that my son left a huge Ribeye out all night on the kitchen counter. After I finished swearing and clanking around the kitchen loudly, I chopped it up and delivered to the chickens with a side of garlic garbonzo's and a 2022 Willamette Valley Pinot Noir. I drank the Pinot waiting for the chicken's review of the meal. Officially it received Chicken Michelin Star 3. Just wanted to add Ribeye to the list of approved Chicken foods.

 

[Brooks_]

They might nibble - they explore the world with their beaks after all - but for most things they will not consume to excess where superior alternatives are available

Mine peck the azaleas (toxic) every time they are out. Decide it still tastes bad and move on.