Chicken Banana Skin Feed

[NameIwish]

I feed my hens banana skins - they absolutely love it. And I get to eat all the banana part myself!

Today, slicing up a couple of skins, I found myself wondering about the economics of feeding banana skins to my seventeen hens and a rooster. So, I grabbed a banana and weighed it. Then I peeled off the skin and weighed that.

And then I got carried away again, and:
Pricing Banana Skins

A randomly selected banana weighed 5ive Ounces.
The skin of that subject banana weighed 2wo ounces.
That equates to a ratio of Banana flesh to Skin of 6ixty/4orty.
The wife paid 50ifty-5ive cents per pound for the 25ive bananas.
So 40rty %rcent of $0.50ifty-5ive equals $0.20ty-2two cents per pound for the banana skins and $0.30ty-3ree cents per pound for the banana flesh itself.

Now Cracked corn's going for as little as $8.79 at the moment and Scratch Grains for 11enty something for a 50ty pound sack. Layer crumbles are right at or maybe a bit less than the prices of Scratch Grains at our closest Rural King.

Fifty pounds of fresh banana skins would cost (50*$0.22=$11en at today's price for bananas). At Aldi, the price was just 50ty cents/lb so 11en less 10en %rcent = $10en80ty-9ine!

It is worth noting that ripe bananas are sweeter, as are the skins off ripe bananas. And, most, if not many, if not all grocery stores will discount the price when their stock turns a bit brown.

Here, Food Lion's latest price for Ripe Bananas is $0.19een cents a pound. That works out to $3ree.80ty for a 50ifty pound bag of ripe banana skins.

So, since the "all natural" banana skins offer even more than natural sugars, potassium and moisture, why not save the skins, slice them into little skin-bits and offer them along with other food scraps to those egg-laying hens out there in your coop?

It's all in the preparation, Right?

 

[GodLovesU]

Wow!You should post this as an article.

 

[The Moonshiner]

Why would chickens want to live off banana skins?
I'll stick with chicken feed.

 

[Altairsky]

I think banana skins have a lot of pesticides. Banana skins are not meant to be eaten by humans so the amount of pesticides on the surface of a banana is not a problem.

 

[Red-Stars-in-RI]

Banana skins are obviously not a complete ration, but as a treat, if the flock likes them, it's an option. The pesticide thing is a potential concern. Organic bananas may cost more but should avoid most or all of the pesticide issue. Washing may also remove any residual pesticide.

On your math...since most people aren't going to eat or otherwise use the banana peel, you could probably consider that part "free". The peel is just an all natural "package" - like the carton around a half gallon of milk.

 

[bearcreekbees]

You are doing the wrong math. You are looking at the cost but your calculations ignore the nutritional aspect of feeding banana peels to your flock.

You should take another run at it from a different perspective. First, determine what your flock's nutritional needs are. Then get or create a feed calculator and plug in the values for whatever food materials are available to you. Then try to come up with a ration that both utilizes your resources and meets the nutritional needs of the flock.

Bananas are low in protein and fat, so while they have some great vitamins and minerals they will only "dilute" the nutrition that is in whatever else you are feeding your flock. But if you take that into consideration and then compensate by adding in more foods that are higher in protein and fats you could potentially balance the ration out.

Personally, if I wanted to really utilize banana peels (and I do use a lot of them), I would buy some composting worms, feed most of the banana peels to the worms, and then feed the worms to the chickens as a more nutritious alternative treat. I could still feed a small quantity of the banana peels to the chickens as another treat, but without reducing the flock's overall nutrition too much.

 

[NameIwish]

Why would chickens want to live off banana skins?
I'll stick with chicken feed.

Well, why would chickens want eat cracked corn? Not exactly a naturally occurring item (looking back to when chickens were first - well, who knows.)

I throw food scraps down and if they gather round and eat them up, I provide more as it comes available. If they leave it on the ground, it becomes fertilizer (or maybe rabbit or rat food).

Point was, waste not, want not because a penny saved is a penny earned (and, since they cost about three cents to manufacture - the adage has been inflated accordingly and A penny saved is three cents expended).

 

[Zenmonkey]

First, this thread was started in October 2024, so? How has the feeding of banana peels gone? Successfully?

I've seen bananas growing. I don't think there's a lot of pesticides used. The peels are thick and the primary pests are vertebrates not insects.

I feed banana peels to guinea pigs and rabbits. They love them, and zero processing is required. Both those species are not terribly tolerant of free sugar in their diets, and banana peels strike a nice balance between having adequate fiber and not excessively high sugar.

Also, to revisit the original math, brown banana are often cheaper, but the skins are also noticeably thinner. Does this change the arithmetic significantly?

 

[NameIwish]

You are doing the wrong math. You are looking at the cost but your calculations ignore the nutritional aspect of feeding banana peels to your flock.

You should take another run at it from a different perspective. First, determine what your flock's nutritional needs are. Then get or create a feed calculator and plug in the values for whatever food materials are available to you. Then try to come up with a ration that both utilizes your resources and meets the nutritional needs of the flock.

Bananas are low in protein and fat, so while they have some great vitamins and minerals they will only "dilute" the nutrition that is in whatever else you are feeding your flock. But if you take that into consideration and then compensate by adding in more foods that are higher in protein and fats you could potentially balance the ration out.

Personally, if I wanted to really utilize banana peels (and I do use a lot of them), I would buy some composting worms, feed most of the banana peels to the worms, and then feed the worms to the chickens as a more nutritious alternative treat. I could still feed a small quantity of the banana peels to the chickens as another treat, but without reducing the flock's overall nutrition too much.

Gosh, folks, I never said I was substituting banana peel for cracked corn!

I 'did that Math' as an aside. Since I once threw all the peels away (at one time, into a composting bin thing I built) calculating my cost of the peels allowed me tout a second benefit of diverting peels to beaks instead of trash cans.

Geeze people will argue over anything!

 

[NameIwish]

First, this thread was started in October 2024, so? How has the feeding of banana peels gone? Successfully?

I've seen bananas growing. I don't think there's a lot of pesticides used. The peels are thick and the primary pests are vertebrates not insects.

I feed banana peels to guinea pigs and rabbits. They love them, and zero processing is required. Both those species are not terribly tolerant of free sugar in their diets, and banana peels strike a nice balance between having adequate fiber and not excessively high sugar.

Also, to revisit the original math, brown banana are often cheaper, but the skins are also noticeably thinner. Does this change the arithmetic significantly?

'The Math' was an aside.

At our Food Lion, they discount the 'ripe' fruit by half or more - so, if the skins have less moisture (and, consequently less volume and weight) the loss of value is likely compensated by the reduction in cost.

Again, I only add peel as a supplement/treat.

Chickens are free to eat them or leave them. That they eat them tells me their eons of existence have taught them that there's good in them thar peels - who are we to dispute creatures that have been foraging long before we were a branch on the evolutionary 'tree' or whatever?