Re: Keeping chickens in back garden

In article <fi1k5o$enf$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
Dead Paul <dead_paul@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Wed, 21 Nov 2007 09:55:59 +0000, Gordon Henderson wrote:

You can buy organic feed for round about £9 for 20Kg

OK but will they eat household leftovers and still thrive/produce eggs?

Maybe.

I too am thinking of keeping chickens but I will not be interested in
feeding them any for farm produced feed - the feed could easily be
contaminated with veterinary antibiotics thus defeating the object of
keeping chickens. Poultry and eggs has a big problem with lasalocid
residue as does milk/cheese/beef and lamb. See www.freewebs.com/lasalocid

I guess you can help avoid this by buying feed from a reputable place -
I use Mole Valley Farmers in the South West who mill their own feeds -
I've no idea about contamination though...

Chickens naturally eat a variety of animal and vegetable matter - eg.
worms, grubs, insects and so on, as well as grass (makes the yolks
yellower!) and just about anything green (inc. ivy and bamboo, although
they avoid my Olive tree, but they stripped the holly and jasmine )-:

They also need calcium, so if your garden is lacking in this, then a
tub-full of mixed grit is essential - and like all birds, they need grit
too as it helps them grind up their food.

So with a bit of care, you could feed them on kitchen scraps (and we do
from time to time), but we tend to only buy or grow what we need, so
don't often have much in the way of scraps... And you would need to
generate a lot of scraps, AND clean the remains (hard stalks, etc.) up
afterwards to discourage pests and stop it rotting.

We've just given ours the full range of the garden, as we've pulled up all
the veg, etc. that we're going to eat this year, and they're not eating
as much of their usual feed as they have been - although this could
be as much a side-effect of shorter days and not laying eggs, as them
having the means to eat all the weeds, etc. in the rest of the garden!

Gordon
.

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