If you've had chickens for more than five minutes, you've probably already realized that these feathered lunatics will eat just about anything. Dropped your sandwich? Gone. Left your shoelaces untied? Pecked to oblivion. Your earring fell out? Say goodbye.

But just because a chicken will eat something doesn't mean it should. Some foods make perfectly good treats, while others can cause problems or be downright dangerous. Knowing the difference can help you keep treats fun without accidentally screwing up the balanced diet your chickens actually need.

So, let's talk about what can go in the treat bucket, what should stay out of it, and why your chickens should never be allowed to make these decisions for themselves.

What Can Chickens Safely Eat?

Chickens can safely enjoy a pretty wide variety of foods. Fruits, vegetables, grains, and some protein-rich foods can all make good treats when they're fed in moderation. Strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, watermelon, pumpkin, squash, cucumbers, leafy greens, cabbage, and plenty of other produce can all be offered as occasional extras.

Spinach is safe too, despite some of the warnings you'll see floating around online. It contains oxalates, which can bind calcium, so I wouldn't make a giant pile of spinach a daily part of the diet of laying hens. A little spinach tossed to the flock occasionally isn't something I'm going to lose sleep over.

Chickens can also have grains such as oats, rice, wheat, barley, and cracked corn. Corn gets blamed for all kinds of things in chicken groups, but corn itself isn't bad for chickens. It's already an ingredient in plenty of complete poultry feeds. The problem comes when chickens fill up on corn, scratch grains, or other treats instead of eating enough of their nutritionally complete feed.

Protein treats are another option, especially during molt when chickens are growing an entirely new set of feathers. Dried mealworms, black soldier fly larvae, scrambled eggs, and small amounts of plain cooked fish are all options. Mealworms are particularly useful around here because the chickens go absolutely nuts for them, which makes them pretty handy when I need to convince everybody that coming when called was their idea.

And yes, chickens can eat eggs. Feeding cooked eggs to chickens does not magically turn an entire flock into egg-eating criminals. If you choose to feed eggs back to your flock, scrambling or otherwise cooking them also makes them less recognizable as the same thing sitting in the nest box.

One thing I've learned over the years is that chickens have surprisingly strong opinions about treats. One flock will lose its collective mind over watermelon while another looks at it like you've personally offended them.

Apparently we're running a restaurant now.

What Foods Should Chickens Avoid?

The list of foods chickens truly shouldn't eat is much shorter than the internet sometimes makes it seem, but there are a few things that don't belong in the treat bucket. Chocolate and other significant sources of theobromine or caffeine should be avoided. Raw or undercooked dried beans can contain high levels of lectins and shouldn't be fed either. Moldy or spoiled food belongs in the trash or compost, not in the chicken run.

Avocado deserves a little more explanation because you'll often see “avocado is toxic to chickens” repeated as though the entire thing is equally dangerous. The skin and pit contain higher concentrations of persin and shouldn't be fed to chickens. The flesh contains much less, but avocado is also high in fat and there's really no good reason to make it a chicken treat. Around here, I'd rather just keep the avocado for myself.

Then there's an entirely different category of things chickens shouldn't eat: things that aren't food in the first place.

Chickens investigate the world with their beaks, and occasionally their decision-making skills leave a lot to be desired. Styrofoam, rubber bands, pieces of plastic, paint chips, bits of hardware, string, and other small objects can become surprisingly interesting when you're a chicken. Keeping the coop and run free of trash and foreign objects is much easier than dealing with whatever happens after somebody decides a screw looks delicious.

Just because a chicken is willing to eat something is not evidence that it's edible.

How Many Treats Can Chickens Have?

Treats should be exactly that: treats. The majority of a chicken's diet should come from a nutritionally complete poultry feed appropriate for its age and stage of life.

You'll often hear this described as the 90/10 rule, with roughly 90% of the diet coming from complete feed and no more than about 10% coming from treats. That's a useful guideline, but please don't feel like you need to follow your chickens around with a calculator. The point is simply that treats should make up a small part of what they eat.

Complete poultry feed is formulated to provide an appropriate balance of protein, amino acids, vitamins, minerals, energy, and other nutrients. When chickens fill up on scratch grains, corn, mealworms, kitchen scraps, or whatever else they've convinced you to hand over, they're eating less of the food designed to meet those nutritional needs. Over time, too many extras can contribute to an unbalanced diet, excess weight, poorer laying performance, or other health problems.

Laying hens should also have access to an appropriate calcium source such as oyster shell offered separately so they can consume it as needed. Chickens that don't have access to appropriately sized stones or grit naturally may also need insoluble poultry grit to help the gizzard grind food, particularly when they're eating foods other than complete commercial feed.

Basically, you don't need to suck all the fun out of giving your chickens treats. Just don't let snacks become dinner.

No matter what the chickens tell you.

Common Myths About Feeding Chickens

While we're here, we might as well clean up a few feeding myths because chicken groups certainly aren't going to run out of them anytime soon.

Myth: Chickens can eat anything. Chickens will certainly attempt to prove this one true, but willingness and safety are two very different things. A chicken pecking at something doesn't mean her digestive system has reviewed and approved it.

Myth: Feeding chickens eggs will make them eat their own eggs. Not necessarily. Cooked eggs can be fed back to chickens as an occasional food without automatically creating an egg-eating habit. Egg eating in the nest can have several contributing factors, and blaming the scrambled eggs you fed three Tuesdays ago is a pretty big leap.

Myth: If humans can eat it, chickens can too. Nope. Humans safely eat plenty of things that aren't appropriate for chickens, and we also prepare some foods in ways that make them safer to eat. Raw dried beans are a good example. “It's food” isn't enough information to decide whether it belongs in the chicken run.

This is also why I don't love giant internet graphics claiming to list every food chickens can and can't eat. Context matters. Amount matters. Preparation can matter. And there's a big difference between “this isn't a particularly useful treat” and “this is toxic.”

What If Your Chicken Eats Something Toxic?

First, don't panic just because your chicken stole one bite of something from your plate. What the substance was, how much the bird ate, the bird's size, and other factors can all affect the risk.

If you know or suspect your chicken ate something potentially toxic, remove access to it so the bird can't eat any more and figure out exactly what was consumed if you can. If the substance is known to be dangerous, a significant amount may have been eaten, or your chicken is showing signs of illness, contact a veterinarian who treats poultry for guidance rather than trying random treatments from social media.

Concerning signs after a suspected poisoning can include unusual lethargy or weakness, loss of appetite, diarrhea, difficulty walking, tremors, seizures, or other abnormal neurological behavior. The symptoms can vary depending on what was eaten, so don't wait for a particular checklist of signs if you already know your bird got into something dangerous.

And don't start forcing liquids, oils, charcoal, Epsom salts, or whatever emergency remedy somebody on Facebook swears saved their cousin's chicken unless you've confirmed that treatment is appropriate for what your bird actually consumed. Poisoning isn't one condition with one universal treatment.

Chickens are endlessly curious, which is one of the things that makes them so entertaining. Unfortunately, curiosity does not always come packaged with good judgment. Feed a balanced poultry diet, keep treats as treats, and make sure the genuinely dangerous stuff stays somewhere your flock can't get to it.

And if your chickens are staring at your lunch like they haven't eaten in a week, don't take it personally. They'd probably do the same thing to anyone holding a sandwich.

🐔

Every snack's approved.
According to the chickens.
They're often wrong.