The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Poultry & Waterfowl => Topic started by: mintytwoshoes on October 18, 2015, 05:56:00 pm
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Hi,
Just interested to find out everyones experience with egg laying as to what age chickens cease to lay! I think it must vary from breed to breed am I correct? What is the oldest laying hen in peoples experience?
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hey how r u
well it does vary alot we farm them commercial now from small acorns might oaks grow as its happened
we are just putting in some new p.o.l birds at the end of next month we order the birds as day old chciks then they are reared for us up to 16 weeks old , on our old contract we had to get rid of hem at 72 weeks of age but they will still lay , they will lay up to three years on some occasions ,however the shell quality will go down a lot and the number of eggs will decrease,
some breeds will just stop after a couple years others will push on for another but over the years the crucial thing we have noticed if you bring the birds into lay to early not allowing them to put on enough weight then it will reduce there laying life
allowing them to molt over winter will refresh and keep them laying for longer the longest we have kept a flock in lay was 108 weeks but the % of lay wasn't very good towards the end and the number of poor shell eggs even with oyster shell and grit plus extra water based vits made little to no difference hope thats answers your question
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I purely do as a hobby and have chickens aged 5 yr still laying admittedly only occasionally but the eggs still taste good
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My Pekins were amost 6 years old and still laying 3 or so eggs a week each when the fox got them.
They were free range and were very spoilt as they were pets.
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Hi minty :wave:
All by birds must be ancient as am currently getting no eggs
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We have 5 ½ year old Wyandottes still laying regularly and we bred from them this year, good strong chicks. According to an old poultry book I have a Frenchman did a study back around 1900 and concluded that hens only have 600 eggs to give -you either get them quickly or slowly. I have heard a figure of 700 eggs mentioned but have no idea where that number came from.
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I believe this is true. Regardless of breed, all hens have pretty much the same number of eggs in them. A commercial hybrid doing 320 in year 1 and 250 in year 2 is just about worn out. That said, the slower layers often don't survive long enough to get through all their eggs or medical issues stop them laying early.
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I have found warrens don't lay much after 2 years old and the shells become thin, but l have 2 speckledy and sussex still laying at 4 years and Indian Game of 6 years still lays in the summer. My mixed flock, mostly old girls are laying though not as many a week but eggs all good.