“I wonder which kind of
winter green chickens like best?” I pondered on a rare sunny day in
early January.  The obvious solution was to outsource my question
to the chickens.

The thing is, I thought I already knew the answer.  Over the last month,
I‘ve dropped off chickweed, brussels sprouts, and swiss chard in the
tractor, and the brussels sprouts seemed to be the favorite by
far.  However, our chickens are ornery, so when I pulled out the
camera, two out of three went for the chickweed, and the third soon joined them.  Brussels sprouts were a runnerup, and Swiss chard was barely pecked at.



I’m not sure why
chickweed was less favored a week ago, then was suddenly first
choice.  Perhaps it was a matter of weather — my taste test
occurred during a warm spell when everything was thawed, and previously
I’d been dropping off primarily frozen greens in the tractor.  Or
maybe the chickens were just sick of daily brussels sprouts and wanted a
change.



Either way, it got me
curious.  Have you tried your chickens on various types of winter
greens?  What’s their favorite?

Feeding snails to your
chickens could be as easy as a stroll through your garden.



Try an experiment to see how
many snails you can find in 15 minutes…if the answer is more than a
handful then you can probably justify the time spent by the increased
protein and love your chickens will receive. The added bonus will be
that many less snails attacking your lettuce.



Image credit and inspiration
goes to Jenn’s
gardening spot blog post
on how she collects snails every morning for her flock.