Ever wondered if you can feed your guineas with tomatoes? Then you should read this article to the end
Guinea fowl eats tomatoes. They love very ripe tomatoes, which come very fresh from the tomato plant vines. Guinea fowls could quickly jump, bite/peck tomatoes that are on the vines.
But it would be best if you got the tomatoes out of the vines before you feed them to your guinea fowls.
This article would talk about the health benefits of consuming tomatoes to guinea fowls, the number of tomatoes you could feed them in one day, if tomatoes are toxic to your guinea fowls, if baby guinea fowl can eat tomatoes if your guinea fowls can eat tomato sauce if they can consume tomato seeds and the ways you could feed your birds tomatoes.
What are the health benefits of tomatoes for guinea fowls?
There are several health benefits when it comes to your guinea fowls consuming tomatoes.
These benefits include your guinea fowls getting a high amount of Vitamins A and Vitamins E and having other nutrients, like lycopene, an antioxidant.
Your guinea fowls need to consume vegetables for them to improve their rate of digestion.
Tomatoes help guinea fowls in the provision of vitamins and enough minerals.
How many tomatoes can I feed them in a day?
You can feed a single guinea fowl around six to eight very ripe tomatoes in a day.
But don’t feed them this number of tomatoes every day.
You could give them this number on a treat day.
Your guinea fowls consuming tomatoes every time would ruin the fun.
Consuming vibrant and very ripe tomatoes is suitable for your guinea fowls, but it should be done on special occasions.
Make sure as you feed your guinea fowls these tomatoes.
You give them enough water too. Also, please don’t make it a habit of only feeding them tomatoes.
Yes, tomatoes are good and very important for the growth and development of your guinea fowls. But it should be backed up with other meals your guinea fowls need.
These other meals include chicken feed, turkey feed, guinea fowl feed, and enough water.
This way, your guinea fowl ends up growing properly, growing healthy, and living its best life.
Even with the presence of ripe tomatoes, without other food sources available, your guinea fowl would suffer from an unbalanced diet.
Feeding your guinea fowls six to eight ripe tomatoes daily along with other essential meals would leave your guinea fowls to grow and mature properly.
Related: Here is an article I wrote on can guinea fowls eat chicken food?
Are tomatoes toxic for guinea fowls?
Tomatoes are not toxic to guinea fowls. Your guinea fowls love ripe tomatoes.
The problem comes when your guinea fowl consumes the leaves or the vines of the tomato plant for too long.
If they keep doing this, it could be detrimental to their health, and they could fall ill. It is the leaves that are toxic to your guinea fowls.
But the fruit itself, that is, the ripe tomato, is good, excellent, and relatively healthy to your guinea fowls.
Can baby guinea fowls eat tomatoes?
Baby guinea fowls, also known as keets, can also eat tomatoes.
They need to consume tomatoes because it would help them grow and mature properly.
In the absence of meals like tomatoes and various other greens, they would look deformed and malnourished as they grow.
But when you feed them with appropriate amounts of tomatoes, they grow up, develop and look good.
Can guinea fowls eat tomato leaves?
It would be best if you did not let your guinea fowls eat tomato leaves.
If you allow your guinea fowl free-range and see a garden that tomatoes are grown there, your guinea fowl would want to eat the leaves off the vines of the tomato plant.
You certainly do not want that because these leaves are toxic to your guinea fowls when consumed in high quantity.
These are the reasons why you need to place your tomato garden a little bit far away from your guinea fowl coop or shelter.
Then it would be best if you gave them ripe tomatoes from your hand. Like after you pluck the tomatoes from their plant vines, you hold the tomatoes and feed them.
If you have many guinea fowls in your guinea fowl coop, you should arrange the tomatoes into their feeders.
This way, they get to eat the tomatoes themselves and not eat the tomatoes from the plant vines like they would have done if they had access to the entire tomato plant garden.
Also check out this article I wrote on can guinea fowls be tamed?
Can guinea fowl eat tomato sauce?
Your guinea fowl can eat Tomato sauce without any problem.
Your guinea fowl can eat any food we humans can eat. It all depends on the quantity of food that’s given to them.
When feeding your guinea fowls meals like tomato sauce, make sure you don’t give them too much.
You could pour the tomato sauce you want to feed to your guinea fowls on the floor, or you could put it in their feeder plates.
This way, your guinea fowls would quickly consume the tomato sauce.
When they get satisfied, they would go on and consume the next thing available.
Can guinea fowls eat tomato seeds?
Oh yes. Your guinea fowls can eat tomato seeds. These tomato seeds have high amounts of Vitamin A and Vitamins E.
These have several other nutrients, like providing your guinea fowls with lycopene.
Lycopene serves as a potent antioxidant that has various health benefits.
When your guinea fowl consumes the seeds of tomatoes, it helps protect them from the sun, improves the health of their hearts, and reduces the risk of your guinea fowls getting different types of cancer.
How can I feed tomatoes to my birds?
If you want to feed your tomatoes to your birds or your guinea fowls, you need to cut minimal parts relative to the size of either your bird or the guinea fowl.
For instance, if you want to feed a chicken, you need to cut a little chunk around ¾ inch square.
This makes the whole tomato safe for your chicken to consume.
The same rule applies if you want to feed a guinea fowl.
So the larger the bird, the increase the scale.
The smaller the bird, you reduce the scale.
It would be best if you feed your birds with tomatoes once weekly.
If you don’t, the chances of getting health complications will keep increasing.
Conclusion
Your guinea fowls love eating tomatoes. They prefer the very ripe red ones.
The green tomatoes aren’t healthy for your guinea fowls, and they don’t like it too.
You should not allow your guinea fowls to eat tomatoes from the vines of the tomato plant because if they do, they would want to eat the leaves, which are toxic to them.
But your guinea fowls love the seeds of tomato plants because it has many vitamins and lycopene which protects the heart of your birds.
It would be best if you did not feed your guinea fowls tomatoes daily.
You should feed it to them as a special treat, and when you do, cut it according to the size of the bird and give them around six to eight.
Spread it for all the guinea fowls around to enjoy.
There are no special times to feed guinea fowls tomatoes.
You could try using it as a great to get them into the coop when darkness comes.
