Paprika?? Does it work?

[Stuart77047]

Do it will not do the birds any harm to feed them that. I understand now about the medication.

Do you know that when people want to go on a diet and loose weight they can eat chillies and paprika too as it boosts the metabolism. I tried it once, but it had no effect on me. In fact I now am hooked on chillies and eat lots of spicy food........but am getting fatter!

Me too, but it is most likely the beer I drink with the spicy food and not the spicy foods themselves.

 

[ThatChick]

Paprika (US English) is made from peppers with very low capsaicin %. That is why paprika is not hot. Almost everywhere else in the world paprika is any ground red pepper. So it can range from mild to extremely hot. It the US we break it out to things like chili powder, paprika and cayenne/red pepper. If you are going to try this you should use the hottest pepper you can find, which will probably be cayenne. Also don't worry about the hotness bothering the chickens. No bird has the receptors for capsaicin. The theory is that the plants developed capsaicin to ward off mammals. Also if you think about it, why would you have your fruit so hot that nothing would eat it if you produce fruits to help disperse seeds.

I have my doubts that this will do any good though. I don't know if parasites have these receptors either. So I think it may not affect them at all either. But you never know until you try.

If this works, just plant some cayenne peppers in your garden and feed them to the chickens.

Very good point. Most paprika is super mild here. You can buy a Hungarian HOT paprika that comes in a metal red can and it does have some good heat, but personally I love my paprika way too much to give it to my chickens. It has to say HOT paprika on the package otherwise it'll just be sweet paprika and like Stuart said that's going to have a very low amount of capsaicin.

 

[DamselinFlannel]

Don't know about paprika... Believe it or not, my husband is massively allergic to it (similar to an allergy to peanuts). He is also allergic to chicken, which is really depressing.

But I would consider adding apple cider vinegar to their water!

 

[Reurra]

I added apple cider vinager this morning. Although i was guessing at the amount. I put in about 1 cup for 2 gallons.

 

[7L Farm]

I added apple cider vinager this morning. Although i was guessing at the amount. I put in about 1 cup for 2 gallons.

I mixs one tablespoon per gallon.

 

[Florida_country_boy]

Paprika (US English) is made from peppers with very low capsaicin %. That is why paprika is not hot. Almost everywhere else in the world paprika is any ground red pepper. So it can range from mild to extremely hot. It the US we break it out to things like chili powder, paprika and cayenne/red pepper. If you are going to try this you should use the hottest pepper you can find, which will probably be cayenne. Also don't worry about the hotness bothering the chickens. No bird has the receptors for capsaicin. The theory is that the plants developed capsaicin to ward off mammals. Also if you think about it, why would you have your fruit so hot that nothing would eat it if you produce fruits to help disperse seeds.

I have my doubts that this will do any good though. I don't know if parasites have these receptors either. So I think it may not affect them at all either. But you never know until you try.

If this works, just plant some cayenne peppers in your garden and feed them to the chickens.

My main hobby is growing rare peppers and tomatoes. I also read on this site that chickens are immune to caspium, so I decided to test this for myself. I gave my chickens a Ghost Chile(Bhut Jolokia) which is over 1 million Scoville Units. Let me just say this, they are not immune to caspium. Try it for yourself and you will see. They learned their lesson very fast, and they never touch my peppers. They have stipped all the leaves off a pepper plant before, but they don't mess with the fruit. The weakest pepper I grow is the Red Savina, at 500k SHU, former world record holder. Everything else I grow is hotter.

Also, Cayenne is not anywhere close to the hottest pepper you can find. Cayenne is 50k-SHU, and the University of New Mexico just broke the world record again with the Moruga Scorpion at 2 Million SHU.

 

[ReikiStar]

I would second 1 tablespoon of AVC per gallon of water. And I read somewhere on BYC that someone used Cayenne to cure and prevent blackhead disease in turkeys. Also seen on BYC, raw pumpkins seeds and cayenne to ward off worms. I'd use them as a preventive and stick with the regular wormers if you really need to clear them out.

Reurra - Glad to hear your rescue chickens are doing so well!

 

[JMarch]

I use paprika to increase the amount of plant based carotenoids in their diet to produce lovely, dark orange yolks. We're just starting up with chicken again- mine are close to "point of lay"- so no eggs yet, but their legs and skin are a nice dark yellow-orange!

 

[Lewjay]

I put a little chlorine bleach in my waterers to keep the algea growth away. Gets really hot here in Ga and green stuff gets in the water fast. I had also heard to sprinkle DE *(food grade) on the food to act as a wormer.

 

[Frances L]

I would second 1 tablespoon of AVC per gallon of water. And I read somewhere on BYC that someone used Cayenne to cure and prevent blackhead disease in turkeys. Also seen on BYC, raw pumpkins seeds and cayenne to ward off worms. I'd use them as a preventive and stick with the regular wormers if you really need to clear them out.

Reurra - Glad to hear your rescue chickens are doing so well!

True, about blackhead and turkeys