I recently moved next door to a neighbor with free range chickens and guineas. I don't mind them coming into my yard. They are fun to watch. However, I am a big time gardener and am wondering if there plants that are very toxic to poultry and they don't manage to learn to avoid eating the seeds, etc.
Any advice?
Thanks!
chickens and toxic plants
My chickens free range around my gardens all the time and I've never had one touch the toxic plants. They are pretty smart about that.
i would agree. you can also google it, or search through this forum for the link, i know there are some lists out there on the WWW...
here's one:
http://www.poultryhelp.com/toxicplants.html
Thanks TamaraFaye! Great site. After looking, it is obvious chickens are smart eaters because there are so many things that are toxic to them. lol
yeppers, they are smart, and if you get good foragers, they seem to know where to dig, they don't scratch just for the exercise...
which means you will have less bugs. however, they like little sprout too, so if/when you have something coming up, you might put a milk crate over it temporarily!
Absolutely! They love to dig up new things you just put in, as well. They are very good at digging, they just have a different sense of style about how it should look!
diggers and watchers FOR SURE. they are scroundrels in my flower beds. I only put up with them because my neighbor is 81 yo and I want to humor her in her very old age. the funniest part is that she rarely offers me any eggs and is obvious of the efforts I go to protect things from her chickens. Lost in her own world I guess.
I have laid chicken wire flat or branches over all my flower beds. not sure how things are gonna go once things come up and the flat chicken wire is no longer practical. Being in the country there is abundant field and brush. Hopefully when spring arrives they will find more goodies elsewhere. We have been in drought for almost a year and I think it is increasingly hard for them to find goodies. They are now digging in places that they have never shown any interest in before. I hear they are death to slugs and many insects and they discourage voles, That is great since it's harder to protect plants from those than from chickens. I love her guineas though, they eat bugs but don't dig. Sweeties. Too bad the owls and perhaps foxes are snatching them off even though they are put up at night.