Gardening with chickens

[Britesea]

I have all raised beds, with a 4 foot post at each end and a ridge pole across the top. I can put frost cloth over the bed to extend the season, or bird netting to keep birds out of the crops, shade cloth to keep spring greens from bolting so fast, etc or create a trellis for the climbers. I haven't let the chickens into the garden itself, but they roam all around it and get a lot of the bugs that are trying to move in. I may have to let them in to keep the grasshoppers down though... even Neem Oil hasn't done more than just slow down the damage a bit. Our season is so short, that the only time I can see to let them in while protecting our main crop - especially the tomatoes and squashes, would be AFTER the first freeze.

 

[Mini Horses]

Britesea, you have a perfect set up for keeping them off of plants they want to invade....just made a few panels of fence that are from edge of bed to crosspole and lean them up there. They don't always eat it. EXCEPT blueberries. LOL Watched them jump and pick mine! No wonder I wasn't getting any

Some plants they don't want. So protect others. Could work a few hours, couple times a week and help you out. Mine love to jump in their high grass and catch hoppers. Fun to watch. Sometimes I throw a little scratch feed along a building so they scratch the grass/weed up.

 

[milkmansdaughter]

@Britesea do you have any pictures? That sounds like a great system!

@cabinguy that looks like a great idea. You Could also do it with pigs.

 

[Hope Hughes]

Read once where a lady liked chickens in the garden, after plants were large enough to allow them in, but she hated their attacking a ripe tomato. She then painted some rocks red and placed them about the rows of tomato plants before the fruits ripened. The chickens pecked at the rocks, got nothing. She swears they rarely attacked a real tomato after. Probably so. A golf ball in a nest will "help" stop an egg eater once they get nothing a few times. They ain't dumb!

What an awesome idea!! Could definitely see it work just like the fake eggs do!