This spring I bought 8 Welsummers because I wanted their beautiful chocolate brown eggs. They are now 9 months old and have yet to lay a single egg. On top of that, my three mature hens started to molt in August, and were laying sporadically. Then they quit. We haven't had a single egg since September first. Last night when I went out, there were three beautiful eggs waiting for me! After a three month long wait, we finally have eggs!
The chickens spent the summer in our chicken tractors so they could "free range" without danger of predation, or at least to minimize that danger. When they hadn't laid in 8 weeks, I remodeled the bachelor pad and moved them there, to a more traditional chicken house with a yard. I increased their feed from a 16% protein feed to a 20% one. I am also using a heat lamp on the nights that the temperature dips below the freezing mark. Which of these factors broke the strike? I don't know, but I sure am glad about it!
8 comments:
A few things that stood out to me.
Stop using a heat lamp. That is only needed when the chickens are not feathered out yet.
If they are being heated artifically, and the power were to go out, they will have a tough time dealing with the loss of heat.
Try getting them back to an 18% feed, as 20% is for game/meat birds.
Put a regular light bulb in their coop that will come on super early in the morning, ensuring that with actual daylight, they are getting 14 hours of light.
Anytime you make a drastic move, such as tractor to coop, you can throw them off.
We live in Alaska, and do not heat our coop ;o)
Have you ever visited www.backyardchickens.com ?
Paula
Yea! We are getting eggs regularly now too! So exciting! :)
Megan,
Yay! I was beginning to wonder if I was gonna have to relegate them to the stew pot. That was going to make me very, very sad! To feed for almost four months and only get about $1.50's worth of eggs was so discouraging! I've never had that happen before!
Paula,
Yes, Backyard Chickens is in my favorites links, if not directly, then via coop designs. Actually, the heat lamp is needed. My first year, I had some chickens suffer frostbite on their combs, and I don't want to have that happen again. My chicken house is probably not nearly as nice and weather tight as yours, and so that would explain why you are able to do without one. When we build our coop deluxe I don't expect to need one. If there were a power outage, I'd probably have them caught, caged, and in the kitchen, lol! I agree that moving them can throw them off, but they had quit laying for about two months before I made the move, so that isn't it. Thanks for the suggestions. ;-)
~Michelle
Interesting. I have 3 Welsummers, hatched last February. They were the last of my 4 breeds to start laying, and the first to quit. I was disappointed that their eggs weren't all that dark. Pretty speckles, but not very dark. They're lovely hens though. I'm not using any added light because DH is strongly in favor of natural cycles. My Ameraucanas and Barred Holland are still laying though.
Hmmm. Mine were hatched in March, and I've wondered if they were just REALLY slow to mature. I'm certainly not happy with them so far. I agree with not using light for boosting egg production. I think God designed them to take a rest and restore their bodies for the next season. My lighting is for heat, but I realize that it's affecting their laying, too. Actually, I'm concerned about the fact that they are in light virtually 24 hours a day. They have about two hours of darkness each evening before I do chores and turn on the light, but that's it.
Hehe..we have what almost amounts to an open air coop.
Frostbite occurs from moisture and not the cold.
Ya know, as I was hitting publish it occured to me that maybe our high humidity played a role, but I didn't mention it. Now I know...
I'm amazed that you can have an open air coop in AK! I would have thought it would have to be nearly airtight! How cold does it get in your winters? (I know it varies widely depending on what part of the state you are in.)
We can easily get 30 below. Now, we do get little bits of frostbite, but, its generally in our roosters and second year hens.
Got no way of stopping that.
But this year, now that the coop door is never shut, it has been considerably better.
I have ben planning to take good pictures of all the coop revisions we made this summer. Thinking I will do it later on today once its light out, and I will get them posted on our blog.
We as humans do tend to think of it just being a cold exposure thing, but it is a combination of factors.
We live in heated environments, and the areas that get bit first are our cheeks and nose, where our nose and mouth are spreading the moisture, and our feet and hands which sweat a great deal, even when cold.
God created birds with wonderful abilities to stay warm!
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