Saturday, January 12, 2013

Are mulberry leaves poisonous?

I posted in a previous blog that mulberry leaves are poisonous, but when challenged by one of my readers I decided I needed to research this subject.  I'd always been told that dried mulberry leaves were poisonous.  Although I've never had any problems with my livestock, they refuse to eat dry mulberry leaves so I had no proof either way.
http://www.fao.org/ag/AGA/AGAP/FRG/Mulberry/Papers/HTML/Mulbwar2.htm

Mulberry: an exceptional forage available almost worldwide! states that the leaf mineral content is high and no anti-nutritional factors or toxic compounds have been identified.

Mulberry leaves as sheep feed supplement discusses a study that was done to figure out the nutritional content of mulberry leaves.  In this study, they dried the mulberry leaves and then fed them to sheep.

So it looks like mulberry leaves are perfectly safe even when dry!  On top of all this, the leaves are full of protein and rich in nitrogen, sulphur and minerals.  Mulberry leaves caused increased body weight gains in growing lambs and goats, and also included milk production in goats.  Some authors even say that mulberry leaves are as good as alfalfa and other high quality forage.  Therefore, my conclusion is mulberry leaves are not poisonous.  Instead, they make excellent feed fresh or dry!!


3 comments:

  1. Wilted stone fruit leaves are toxic. Cherry being number one. The other thing we have on our property that is listed as toxic is the China Berry trees (wilted leaves) I have read in a few places that only wilted leaves are bad adn if the leaves dry completely they will not cause problems.
    I have planted a lot of stuff specifically for the goats - thornless honeylocust trees (they are only 5 years old or so but they are about 20 ft. tall already!)
    Cottonwood are tasty and shady, but they are not very hardy.
    We just put a few mulberry in last year and I have tried to grow comfrey for fodder, but it doesn't seem to like it here :-/

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  2. I really wanted to grow comfrey too, but I didn't think it would grow. Too bad. I haven't heard of the honeylocust. I will definitely try those. The cottonwood are nice, but they can be so difficult with all the little shoots they send up and look out if you plant them too close to a water pipe! We had a neighbor who planted them around his well. Within a few years he had to redrill in another spot because they had just ruined it.

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  3. For Horses, Are Mulberry leaves loaded with sugar? My OTTB does well eating them. We don't allow our insulin resistant Mustang mare eat them.

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