Frozen Treats for Backyard Chickens

Freezing produce for chickens is a great way to help them beat the heat, get them some extra nutrients, AND keep them entertained.

This is also a great way to extend the life of produce about to go bad. Just remember NOT to use moldy food, potato greens, avocado, dry/uncooked beans, leaves from the nightshade family, apple seeds/stone fruit pits, onions, rhubarb, mushrooms, uncooked pasta or rice, citrus, etc.

(Note: We only kept food/water in the coop while the girls were "coop training". Their run is built and fully enclosed and that is where food/water is kept).

Fruit, vegetables, fresh herbs

Cooked beans, rice

Oats

Mealworms

Water

Ice cube trays/freezable containers

Metal stake/kabob

Cake pans/muffin tins

I love watermelon. So do my chickens. So I like to freeze the rinds and give them to the chickens on hot days. A more entertaining way of giving the chickens large chunks of fruits and vegetables is to stick them on a metal kabob and hang it in the run.

So far I've tried frozen cabbage, sweet potatoes, watermelon rinds. Anything you can stick on a kabob and freeze will work (maybe not bananas).

The cabbage was not a hit.

Take some chopped fruit and/or vegetables and spread it among an ice cube tray. You can also mash up some of the fruit to make a juice that helps all the chop stick together. When the treats are frozen, pop them out and serve to chickens on a tray of some sort.

I also like using watermelon juice to kind of trick my chickens into trying new things. Watermelon works for me because for some reason, my chickens love the color red. They love watermelon and tomatoes, anything else and they stare at it like it's an alien.

Using the cubes trays is great for trying out new foods or foods I'm not sure the chickens will like. The amounts are small, so there's not a ton of waste.

You can also use silicone molds. The paw print molds are filled with lightly boiled mashed sweet potato, good for chicks and pups.

You can make fun shapes and bigger blocks of ice out of cake/bundt cake pans, large tupper ware, bowls etc. Making treats with bigger pans is similar to the ice cube tray method only I add water to fill up the pan and these take longer to melt.