North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Patsy King" <pking888@gmail.com>]

I've found that chickens in the garden are quite destructive with their scratching.  But I have to say that I NEVER see slugs here, which supposedly are a real problem!!  So the question is whether they do more harm than good, a hard thing to answer.  I think it would be possible to cover the strawberry beds with reemay or something, even chickenwire if the area is not too big, but if it is a big garden in question, that is another matter!  

For at least 10 or 15 years I have been thinking how ideal it would be to have a system where you could rotate the chicken pasture from one fenced area to another, and use the unused one for a garden, while the chickens eat up all the weeds and bugs from the other half.  Each year you would just let the chickens use a different part.  the chicken house would be situated between the 2 pasture/garden areas, and you could just let them have access to one field or another.  Or for some parts of the year, they might be able to have access to both parts, but I don't know how that fresh chicken manure would be for the garden half that you would soon be planting.  I think it is an idea worth trying anyway!

Subject: Re: [NAFEX] So close....strawberries
To: "North American Fruit Explorers" <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
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Hmmmm.... any comments on what a bunch of banties coming through and
scratching around my strawberries is likely to do?  Besides activating every
lambs quarter seed and getting some crowns too deep while others are too
shallow?   I'd prefer to lock them up but they lay a lot better running
loose.  Come spring I'll have to lock most of them up for the summer.
Donna