Dried goodies for chickens and ducks during the winter

 In the Garden

Last year, we grew lots of herbs, flowers and vegetables.  All summer and fall, we would harvest and dry some to keep for the girls to use during the winter.  There are lots of benefits to feeding herbs to poultry.  

1. Herbs can provide vitamins and minerals that may not be in their feed.  

2. Herbs are aromatics and this helps to deter pests and make the coop smell better.

3. Finally, herbs and other dried treats can make your poultry happy and happy hens lay more eggs!  

Here are some of the items we dried.  Here are bins of yarrow leaves, kale/swish chard, and comfrey.  I also had a good amount of parsley to add...it may be in with the yarrow.  These were basically the "greens".  Comfrey is a dynamic accumulator so it has lots of micronutrients.

Once the greens were crumbled up, it just filled the bottom of one tub.  Then, I added some dill... 

After that, I cut up some yarrow flower heads...

Added some lavender...

Then, some dried vegetables...mushrooms, zucchini, eggplant, and celery.  I had already kept what we needed, this was all extra that we had grown...

Next came some sage, nasturtium flowers, echinacea and marigold petals...

Now, some fruit, apple and plum...also some carrots and beets...

I did my best to mix this all together...

Then, I divided it up among smaller boxes so we could use one each week for the winter.  

I put it into a rubber tub and let the girls pick at it.  Usually, it's all gone in a couple days.  It is a great boredom buster for them to have something different to pick through...

Here are a couple pintables I found in a blog post by timbercreekfarmer.com about using herbs to keep your chickens healthy.

Here is a pic of Mark collecting comfrey leaves out of the air drying baskets...

Last week, I made a dust bath for the replacement chicks and put some of the herb mixture on top to encourage them to explore the dust bath.

I am still working to grow even more herbs to add to the collection.  I would like to have more oregano for the girls.  Also, I read that chickens love to eat dried rose petals.  We have a couple rather large yellow rose bushes so I want to make sure to collect and dry some this year.

Have an eggcellent day!

~Denise