If you’re wondering what hens eat in Valheim, the answer is seeds.
Hens in Valheim will eat: carrot seeds, onion seeds, birch seeds, beech seeds, and turnip seeds, but will also eat dandelions, and barley. Simply throw them on the floor in front of the hens, and they will begin to breed.
Please note that if you have not progressed past the Plains, then there are spoilers ahead, as these are additions from the Mistlands Update.
Where can I find hens?
After defeating Yagluth (spoiler: the Plains boss), go to Haldor and purchase two eggs for 1,500 gold coins each. You will obviously need two if you want to produce more hens.
Once you have your eggs, return to your base and create an area for your eggs to hatch. It must be near a fire, for warmth, and under shelter if you don’t want to spoil the hatching process if it rains.
Producing a chicken
Once you have put the egg on the ground and kept it in the right conditions for 30 minutes, then a chicken should pop up. Which should look something like this:
This is just a baby hen, similar to a Lox Calf, and will take time to fully mature into a Hen.
It is best to create a small pen or enclosure for the chickens, as they are extremely vulnerable, and can die to even a Greyling. Fix a nice pen around the chickens, and even make it out of Iron to be extra safe.
Producing a hen
Wait around for a few in-game days. If your chickens are securely contained, and you remain near them, they will grow and become hens.
Once the chickens have turned into hens, then you can start placing down the seeds, and they will begin to eat and breed (despite being all female). The hens will lay eggs, and the process will be the same as when you first dropped the egg on the ground.
TIP: If you want to farm only eggs, destroy any source of nearby warmth. The eggs will not hatch into chickens unless near a fire.
Hen colours
There are three colours of hen you can get: white, brown, and a mixture of the two. The chances of getting each are equal, so eventually, you will have one in every colour.
What foods do hens make?
Hens naturally produce Chicken Meat, which if made into Honey-Glazed Chicken, can be an extremely useful source of food – gifting a reasonable 26 stamina to the player, but an enormous 80 health.
Eggs are also a useful ingredient to use in the Cauldron, and you can produce a Cooked Egg with it, and also a Mushroom Omelette.
They are mainly useful for farming Feathers, which were slightly too rare for many players before the Mistlands update.
Looking to kill chickens en masse? Try using an obliterator:
