I was a bit disappointed last week to discover that chickens won’t eat kudzu. Other animals will (goats, for example, love kudzu), but not chickens, even though they like their greens as well as the next animal.
Part of the problem may have been that I boiled the kudzu leaves before giving them to the chickens. Kudzu has many uses (I must post about them someday…) but there’s plenty of it growing along the sides of the road–I don’t want it taking over my house and garden! Unfortunately, boiled kudzu doesn’t seem to appeal to chickens.
If we ever decide to bite the bullet and get a goat, we could feed him year-round on kudzu, if we took the time and trouble to store kudzu hay for the winter. Kudzu is tremendously nutritious (and I happen to think it tastes rather good), even better than alfalfa when it comes right down to nutrient content.
But chickens won’t eat it.
July 24, 2008 at 10:22 am
Don’t boil it and the chickens certainly will eat it. Our hens tear Kudzu to pieces when we put an armful in the coop. They will pick at the leaves all day, and even eat the tender vines. We had no idea they like it until one day we put a baby goat in the chicken coop for an afternoon while we fixed a fence. My husband put some kudzu in the coop for the goat. The kid more or less ignored it, but the chickens went crazy. We’ve given it to them ever since.
We also raise pigeons and they LOVE it too. They eat the leaves and use the vines for nesting.