[Neil Doncaster]

My chicken during the day have free roam of my allotment.I have the opportunity to have a rhubarb plant will i have to fence it off from my hens as the leaves are toxic or will the hens automatically leave it alone

[Aunt Sally]

free roam of the allotment    I hope you don't want to harvest anything you plant 

The leaves are poisonous (oxalic acid).  I would give them a tummy ache    I'm not sure if they will ignore it.

[terrijane]

Hi i hate to say this but all my chickens have eaten the leaves on my rhubarb. I know its leaves are poisonous but too late once they started. the chickens are all ok so unless you want the rhubarb eaten you need to somehow protect them from it.

[judrop]

  Oh dear, I am also guilty, I thought mine would avoid it, but NO they LOVED it leaves and all ! They didnt show any sign of sickness afterwards, but  I will not replace the decimated plant, just incase.
Was it me who said my girls didnt eat greens? 

[richyrich7]

Don't rhubarb leaves act as a natural wormer ? , I know a human has to consume an awful lot to feel bad.

According to wikki you would have to eat 5Kg of leaves to poison yourself  thats a lot of greens 

[viettaclark]

I fenced mine off with chicken wire because the girls were eating the leaves (not as if they don't get greens!) and they still decimated the leaves by pecking through the wire. They LURVE rhubarb! Same with comfrey. Must extend the fence out a bit next year....

[Sassy]

I don't know the effect the toxin in rhubarb will have but just because your chickens don't appear to have ill effects you cannot be sure. There may well be a build up in their organs etc that will take effect after a period of time.

[Flowerpower136]

I moved my rhubard because of the toxin in leaves.  Can you make a 'fruit cage' out of chuck wire to keep out it out of harms way?

Don't fancy your chances at self sufficinecy with the girls helping on the allotment!  Unless perhpas fruit bushes?  Mine only seem to prune shrubs to a certain height.

[beulah59]

The only bit of grass I have left in the hens' area is under the gooseberry bush ... I can't see it lasting once there's fruit on it!

[Jane-M]

My horrors ate all my left over tomato plants last year - I didn't know they were poisonous, the toms never ripened so I chucked em into the run with everything else. they scoffed every leaf and suffered not one bit. I shouldn't risk it twice though  They have never tried to eat rhubarb.

This year I discovered that they can take raspberries on the wing. Them on the wing not the raspberries. We had sort of thought they would eat the lower fruit and we would have the higher. How wrong can you be? So that's raspberries to be moved this winter.