[featherhead]

   I have just read this on the directgov website: "It is illegal to feed chickens with waste food from your kitchen, including vegetable scraps." This suprised me as I have been feeding my chickens with mostly pellets but also some plain pasta, occasional weetabix and vegetable ends and shavings (not much and not everyday of course) as I was advised to feed them these things in my beginers chicken keeping books!
   So I looked into it a little more..
   This is what the defra website says: "Following the outbreak of Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) in 2001, the Government introduced a ban on the feeding to animals of catering waste that contains or has been in contact with animal by-products (ABPs). Catering waste is defined as 'all waste food including used cooking oil originating in restaurants, catering facilities and kitchens, including central kitchens and household kitchens".
  ??
Does this mean I have to stick to 'chicken snack' and mealworms?

[Aunt Sally]

I don't know any back yard chicken keepers who don't give their chooks a few treats from the kitchen

[gracie]

I am only guessing but would this be if you were to sell the chickens for meat or selling the eggs. Can't see it's anyone's business otherwise what you feed animals, children or husbands on when it comes to that.

[Lindeggs]

Most backyard chicken advice books were apparently written before the BSE crisis, which was the reason for the new rules saying you can't feed kitchen scraps to chickens.

[Spana]

There is this from Amazon

 http://tinyurl.com/6fxk25n

[snowdrops]

I went to the Edible Garden Show in March & attended a talk on backyard chickens & the speaker said it was illegal to give the chickens anything that had been in your kitchen.But as we know from on here that is not what most people do. 

[pippa123]

I find this an utterly pointless law and now their planning on culling thousends of badgers because they may or may not be carriers of TB -.-

Preventing poultry keepers from giving their hens table scraps will do nothing to help stop the spread of foot and mouth because like TB it can travel in the air. Very few cows would be effected through backyard keepers giving their birds scraps just more ways for the Goverment to controll us all