V is for Vegetables

I grow herbs, vegetables, fruit and flowers alongside my hens as season follows season. Vegetable-growing works well with hens. Think back to the Second World War, when many families grew veg and kept chickens. Nothing goes to waste as you can always feed surplus vegetables to chickens.

You must plan where to grow your vegetables and how to protect seedlings, young plants and some vegetables if your hens are free-ranging. Netting is an option, as is a vegetable cage. Low fences are also an idea – you can get rolls of green, sturdy chicken wire 2ft high – hens can't really fly over these. They fly onto fences, such as post and rails, because they can perch on rails on their way, but they can't perch on chicken wire. Alternatively, you can use raised vegetable boxes, tunnels, cloches, containers or hanging baskets. Some people mulch around precious plants and seedlings with rough gravel, use crinkly lawn edging or twiggy sticks – all should prevent scratching feet.
Another idea is to use an edging of box or rosemary but this would, obviously, take some time.

To a large extent, what hens eat in a garden depends on how much grass they have access to. The more land they have to free range, the more likely they are to feast on weeds, wild herbs and grass and less likely to eat precious plants, flowers and herbs. I can't emphasise enough how important grass is – my sister in law bought two 20-week-old hybrids recently which had been kept in a barn and put them in a run with grass and they went crazy, pecking at it ferociously as though it would be taken away at any moment. If hens have only a little space to roam and a small area of grass and greenery they will soon eat all the grass and anything else green. It follows that if you keep your hens enclosed and let them out to free range every so often they will eat anything that's green, including vegetables, herbs, weeds, beech hedges and some of your flowers.

Our hens won't touch snowdrops, crocuses, primroses, violas, buttercups, daffodils or tulips. Other flowers they shouldn't be interested in include lavender, roses, asters, camellias, dahlias, azaleas, hydrangeas, chrysanthemums and iris. Most evergreen shrubs, especially prickly ones, are unlikely to be eaten. Strong-smelling herbs such as rosemary, mint, lemon balm and feverfew are not attractive. Mine don't eat parsley or chives but I know of hens that do.

Hens shouldn't touch carrots, parsnips, leeks, onions, potatoes, squash, pumpkins and courgettes. Climbing beans should be fine, once established, as they won't be able to reach most of them (protect seedlings). Hens love surplus sweetcorn.

You could also grow sunflowers and feed them the seeds. Spinach, chard, kale, broccoli, cabbage and lettuce (except for spicy oriental leaves) will be popular; beetroot leaves are relished and my hens also eat beetroot and love Jerusalem artichokes, which I let them nibble on when I have a surplus. They shouldn't, however, eat the leaves, so this is a good vegetable to grow.

On the berry front, hens love strawberries, raspberries and all edible berries except blackcurrants. I managed to video my hens stripping elderberry branches - a whole 16 seconds before my camera packed in!