Commercial feeds often contain added minerals and vitamins, and synthetic mixes are also available, but free range birds can get most of their needs from foraging, as long as you have the right plants growing for them to pick through.
Comfrey is a terrific plant for chooks (and for enriching the vege garden). A good, deep rooted plant rich in minerals, plant comfrey where it can poke its leaves through the fence into the chook run and they will peck at it as they need it.
The brassicas — broccoli, cabbage and caulis — are also good, but don’t expect chooks to eat too much raw cabbage or other stringy greens. They can leave them with a mass of undigested fibre sitting in their crop.
Silverbeet, lucerne, the outside leaves of lettuce, even lawn clippings will be appreciated, as will a lot of weeds — sow thistle, shepherds purse, lotus, dandelions, plantains, nettles, twitch, oxalis and onion weed to name a few. If you are not using moveable arks and your permanent chook run is a decent size it’s the one place you can happily let run to weed.
One of the most important feed ingredients is calcium. All those egg shells have to come from somewhere. If your hens are not getting adequate calcium they will either go off the lay, produce soft shelled eggs or rob their own bodies of calcium supplies.
Avoid this by making sure they get bone meal, or add lime direct to their meal, about 1 per cent by weight. Or give them plenty of shell grit. Besides supplying calcium, grit is the grindstone the chooks need in their crops to help digest all those grains and lumpy bits. They will seek it out after eating so keep a container of grit next to the feeder. Ground up shell is the simplest. Failing sea shells, crush egg shells beyond recognition and feed those back to the hens. If you supply calcium in other forms the chooks may settle for small pebbles or coarse sand as grit.
That takes care of basic needs, but there are lots of treats you can offer to excite the chook palate. If your chook run is movable, keep it in the orchard so they can enjoy the windfalls. If the house is permanent, plant some grape vines over the netting. It provides shade in summer and grapes in autumn.
If you keep ducks instead of chooks, or both, note that while ducks enjoy many of the same foods there are a few differences. They prefer their feed wet so mix mash with plenty of water or milk. They also need more protein than hens, at least 20 per cent protein as a minimum.
Ducks are more creatures of habit than chooks and like a regular routine. If you want to collect eggs, the simplest system is to let them out to forage during the day, call them home about three or four pm with a good feed of mash and scraps and shut them in their pen. Give them a wet mash meal as early as possible the next morning. They should have laid their eggs by nine am and you can let them out again.
Ducks love a stream or pond to swim in but it isn’t vital as long as they have access to good clean water at all times. Just make sure their water bowl is big enough and deep enough for them to get their whole faces in for a good wash.
Like chooks, ducks need plenty of fresh greens but they are excellent foragers and will take care of most of their own requirements if you let them out of their pen onto good pasture every day. They cannot cope with dry mature grass so keep the forage area tender and sweet for them by running a lawn mower over it occasionally. If the birds are penned permanently be sure to bring them a daily selection of fresh greens. Don’t just toss greens into the run, where they’ll wilt and dry out, chop them into small pieces and add them to the drinking water. Your ducks will have fun all day fishing them out.
Whatever feathered fowl you choose to make part of your family, remember that you can learn best from the birds themselves. Watch what foods they scramble for, observe when they lay best and what they were eating at the time. Watch for changes in their feathers when their diet alters.
And remember the pecking order. Sometimes younger birds are bossed away from the trough and have to survive on what falls to the ground. Eventually they will starve unless you feed them separately or put out enough feed to ensure everyone gets their fill.
If you are new to keeping poultry and you practice just some of the tips in this article you will have healthy, happy and contented chooks — and will rarely if ever need to call in the vet.