The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Poultry & Waterfowl => Topic started by: tinwheeler on November 05, 2012, 09:45:52 am
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Hi,
all my girls stopped laying a couple of weeks ago, and it's going to be a long expensive winter of feeding if I get no eggs (have moved to mid Wales this year so is colder and darker than I and they were used to in Southampton).
I understand that by adding artificial lighting on a timer I should be able to get them laying again, but how much and what?
I've put a 60watt bulb in their chicken house and another one on the outside in their run. lights come on at 4.30pm just before it gets dark and go off at about 10pm so they're getting about 14 hrs of light in total. So far no more eggs!
is this enough light? - in the house it seem plenty bright, out in the run not so. They all go inside anyway and are sat on their perches, but awake rather than asleep.
Am I being inpatient? will they start up again soon?
Is there another element I'm missing? - its a lot colder now than it was, but not a lot I can do about that living here!!
help and advice appreciated.
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We don't light ours but from memory, they need 14 hours of daylight for peak laying. The Soil Association, where I read about this, says that you should have artificial light in the morning and natural light at dusk so that they roost normally, rather than just the lights going off. Remember hens can't see in the dark.
I don't know about wattage though and I also don't know if, now they've stopped, they can be coaxed back into lay.
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We had our chickens in when there was the big extended AI outbreak and once when temperatures drop stupidly. We kept lights on. We found that yes, they laid through winter but stopped as soon as they got outside in Springtime, AND took absolutely ages to start up again. I also thought that their health had suffered through 'forcing'. The chickens just looked 'off'.
I would never do this again.
Unless you have young hybrids or pure breed pullets that have gone into lay in the Autumn, you just need to wait for mother nature to do her business and accept that they are not machines and have to rest at some point. You don't mention what you keep, but hybrids such as gold lines, black rock etc are literally designed to lay all year round up until roughly 2.5 years (aside from moult periods). they should not need any extra light anyway. Young pure bred pullets will lay in their first winter but not thereafter, again without extra light.
What you might want to do, is to see the Winter period as an opportunity to boost up any large fowl breeding stock. It is a good time to concentrate on improving their diet, getting them in tip top condition so that their Springtime eggs can produce really good specimens.
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I know it's no good for this year, but when we have a glut in summer, I freeze eggs for use at this time of year.
I whisk up three per pack (I seem to use three at a time) and they freeze fine.
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We have ours on lights. They are set on a timer to come on 3.00am- 7am at the moment and we just adjust it so that they have their 14hrs.
Then as the days get longer we decrease the amount so that it catches up with the natural sunrise/sunset times. (hope that makes sense, i cant think of how else to explain it ??? ) we have 25watt energy saving lights in our sheds which is more than ample for the girls.
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I put LEDs in 2 x 1watt and connected to a simple timer and car battery. It has been set up for about 4 weeks (on same charge) and i have had a great success. I actually think i am getting more eggs now than in summertime? I am getting 18/20 per day out of 26 hens. There are 7 pullets and i don't think 4 of them have laid there 1st yet and the others are from Easter this year?
I have set the timer for 05.00 to 09.00 and then 16.00 to 20.00hrs.
They free range all day from about 07.00 to about 17.30 now the clocks have went back.
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we need chicks for march so we use timers 2 hour es in the morning and 4 hour es At night and give dog or cat food every 2 or 3 days and that gets them in condition . if the eggs come erley we will incubate them and keep them going till Christmas and then let them tick over till spring .Some breeds lay in winter Marians roads etc.
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we have a light for the evenings. usually turn it off at 6pm
we generally get eggs...... except when they are moulting
Mx
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Don't they die sooner if they are forced to lay more than the average or their breed? I'm sure I read forcing them to lay by increasing length of light hours shortens their lives.
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Hybrids have short lives and I think that's to do with how many eggs they lay in their lifetime.
My chooks have lights, partly to keep them laying and partly because it seems so miserable that they should be in darkness for so long during the winter. Their lit coops look friendly and cozy in the evening :D
Their egg production still drops dramatically in winter so I'm not sure it does them too much harm - I have some old ladies who look very happy and healthy still. Mine are all traditional breeds rather than hybrids.
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As i understand it a hen has a fixed number of eggs it can lay in its life, if the bird only lays 6 months of the year it will lay for twice as long as a forced hen that lays all year round. it should not affect age of the bird, but it will have a longer period of zero production before it gets to its maxium age. Hybrids have been crossed to help them lay eggs all year round but as this was the sole target of the crossing many strains are now genetically weak against diesease and that is why they often die earlier.
Remember laying an egg takes alot of of the bird whether breed to do it or not (like giving birth everyday of your life) it envolves alot of protein and minerals, through the summer this can take the birds out of condition, i agree that a rest can only be a good thing to get the birds back on top, espiecally as the cold weather hits their immune system hard at this time of year.
As for lighting and how much, remember that birds do need the light to fade slowly so they can roost as said above, easy to do if you add the light in the morning, the light needs to cover the food and water so that they can still eat and drink during the"extra time" (otherwise they will lose condition quickly). As for light intensity around 50-20 lux, you can buy light meters for about £30 but as a guide that is not that bright your desk in an office should be lit with 500lux on the writing surface, a 50w halogen spot with a 45degree beam angle will light a surface 4m in front of the bulb with about 40-50lux.
Hope this helps
By the way i like the idea of freezing he eggs!
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We used lights in the coop a few years ago with a flock of hybrids and it did keep them laying pretty much flat out all through the winter. Now we only keep pure bred birds and allow nature to take it's course. The young birds who've just come into lay will usually keep going through the winter whereas the older ones have just gone through the moult and are probably not going to lay again until the days get a bit longer again. This way we still get a reasonable supply of eggs while the hens get to have a rest and get back into peak condition ready for the spring.
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Tinwheeler - I think that because your birds had stopped laying, adding light now is not going to suddenly bring them back into lay. It's all part of a natural process. Hens can't lay and moult at the same time; they have responded to the shortening days by beginning their moult and rest period, so now you will have to wait until they have completed that.
They should start to lay again in Jan or Feb and will be all the better for the rest.
In future years, instead of stressing them with winter light, time the buying in of a few young birds which will come into lay in late summer and lay all winter, enough to tide you over until the main flock comes back into lay early in the new year.
Don't think of it as being expensive to feed them over the winter with nothing in return - you are preparing them for a whole new season of laying so they need good nutrition over the winter.
:chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook: :chook:
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I think it's called Stock Management! :innocent:
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I had great advice from the man I get my hens from and like many other answers from the forum I get young chooks around late summer which start laying, fingers crossed, in a few weeks and the older birds moult, rest and start laying when they're ready. I only have a small number, all hybrid, but the black rock never seems to moult! Recently had two old hens and two young cockerels killed, to make way for four new hybrids. Don't know if I want to go through that again!
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My Black Rocks moult along with all the others :) :chook: :chook: :chook:
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We have forced our over winter once but the mortality rate is much higher as a result so never again -ours were Pedigrees. Important to give them a complete break from laying for at least two weeks anyway. The lights went on early morning to give them 12 hours daylight in total. Reason its the morning is to give them time to perch naturally at night, not suddenly plunge them into darkness! we found that, although the coop was big enough, the feed and water inside comined with the bedding resulted in a real mess every morning. Our bedding costs went up as did the time spent cleaning them. The whole exercise was declared fruitless and discontinued.
If you want eggs over Winter buy young hybrids in August and sell them in Spring.
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thanks all for the advice. How old are young birds to come into lay for winter? - We like rearing them in an incubator so would be useful to have an idea of when to put them in to get winter eggs.
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The birds that hatched in march are naw laying iff the wether gets very cold its best to leave them as cold eggs are not fertile the cock bird will loose condition fast in the cold wether . The hens are Wether dependant on condition .Remember it takes a nother month to get full size eggs .
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Up until late Spring will give you good winter laying hens.
However, if you are thinking about wanting good large fowl specimens then the general idea is to hatch sooner rather than later in Spring and to make sure your breeding stock have been well fed over winter (you put them on breeders pellets...extra vit B and riboflavin, good for strong legs). If you were hatching bantams to a high standard then you would leave until summer as the bird size will be smaller and more true to standard.
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We ares still getting seven hens eggs a day from ten hens and three duck eggs from three ducks! I have about forty frozen and groan every time hubby brings more in lol. They just free range and have no lights anywhere.
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Same here, I'm getting 3 to 4 eggs a day from 6 hens. My new pure legbars are youngsters and only started laying a couple of weeks ago - their eggs are white and smaller than the others. They are in a brick garage with outside access which I close up at dark, so they only have natural light. It seems to me there's no hard and fast rule about this. ::)
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we're stopped before I put the light on but we are in mid wales on the side of a mountain so it is colder and darker than elsewhere. just a small light for a couple of hours in the morning (following advice above) and back to 1 a day, which will do!