Chickens not laying

[Vixen218]

Any advice please

My chickens have stopped laying.
3 of them were only 17 weeks old only when we got them 1 1/2 years ago the other 2 were pullets.

What things could stop them from laying?

[Two_Sheds]

Winter?


Animals will only produce young when there's sufficient food to feed them, ie in the spring & summer

http://www.yourchickens.co.uk/care-a...ined_1_1009287

[Nicos]

What breed are they?
My Marans don't lay from about mid Sept to mid March.
The eggs I'm getting from them now are really lacking the lush, dark brown colouring they usually have.

If you want to have eggs over winter you need to review the breed you have.
My banties lay all year. Less often in the winter, and of course smaller than' normal' eggs but at least they keep laying

[veggiechicken]

Have they had a fright?

[Gina's plot]

Hi

They do produce less eggs in the winter, we have a light in their run that we put on when the nights start drawing in , so that they stay up a little longer. We find this helps ours


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[Gina's plot]

Moulting also stops them from laying


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[Bill HH]

A big factor is the amount of daylight, poultry govern their metabolism by the amount of available light, a simple light bulb timed to come on in morning for a couple of hours during the dark and then again in the evening for a couple of hours will make a huge difference. If they are penned in during darkness they will need food and water inside to take advantage of the extra feeding time given by the artificial light. The downside is that as the daylight gets shorter you have to keep adjusting the timer.

[Nicos]

Have they had a fright?

Gosh- yes! ...that's a thought...we have loads of foxes calling during the night in our back field at the moment...maybe you could have that problem too Vixen?

[veggiechicken]

Mine stopped suddenly - it was a weasel or something that had got into the pen.

[kathyd]

Mine are slowing down. Two have stopped completely (well one old dear never really got started this year, 3 tiny eggs in total all year, but I love her anyway ). Even my 'best' layer is losing the colour from her dark brown eggs, as Nicos said. They're moulting, the weather's getting cooler and the days shorter, they're preparing for a well-earned rest . Don't worry about it Vixen, it's quite normal .

[Mikey]

One of mine is moulting for the second time this year, so I guess she's far too exhausted to lay. I don't mind so much, she's a lovely gentle soul. I know when she makes a noise there's a problem as she hardly ever says a peep.

Keep an eye on them, and see if they are doing anything unusual.

[Nicos]

Darn!!!...typical- having said 'it's normal' my gals only laid one egg yesterday between them!
Recently we've been getting 6 or 7 a day ...lets hope we get more today!

[kathyd]

Oh no Nicos! I think you tempted fate there... Fingers crossed for today. How many birds have you got at the moment?

[Nicos]

...well , we had 6 yesterday...phew!
...and yes, I have to admit we have 17 ladies but 5 of them are knocking on a bit, and 3 of them have just come into lay.
Couldn't cope with 17 eggs a day though!

[kathyd]

No, that wouldn't eggsactly be a lot of fun . I must admit I bought 2 newbies this year because laying seemed to have dropped a lot, then I realised various things including the weather probably contributed to this, so now I have 10 birds, of whom one is almost certainly quite elderly and hardly lays at all, another probably a similar age but still laying 2 or 3 a week, and my little 'disabled' one who lays then stops then lays then finds a bush and stashes them so we can't find them ... so I figured time for a bit more input. But if even 7 of them lay regularly, I'll end up with too many just for us - it's quite hard to get the balance right isn't it? I've got a friend I give some to, and a holiday neighbour who buys some when she's here, and I offered someone else the odd tray at a silly price, but then the birds all stopped laying after the first tray and I just looked silly. Although I'm getting quite used to that feeling now .