icelite
In the Brooder
- Apr 9, 2020
- 8
- 7
- 24
I have 5 backyard chickens and this is whole new and fun experience. It is approaching 18 weeks and 2 of them started to lay eggs.
Rhode Island Red and Golden Sex Link have started to lay already. It isn't consistent on the amount of eggs I get each day but usually 2. The have just started laying as of Monday this week. The first eggs from each of these was very soft and hardly no shell. I immediately got some oyster shell and put it in a dish in their coop for free choice. Only these two have been eating some of the oyster shell while the others are not interested. Have noticed that the next round of eggs were normal ( small but had a hard shell ) did find one other soft egg but now each of them has laid over 3 solid eggs.
My question is I still have a large bag of grower pellets which i am feeding them. Will it be okay to keep them on the grower feed and with the side disk of oyster shells for those which want it. I plan on moving to layer pellets once I notice all of them are laying which could be awhile. I have heard most chickens can be over 24 weeks old before they start laying.
The other 3 are Black Australorp, Amerucana and Buff Orpington ( she is starting to make more noise now and might start laying soon - maybe ).
Anyway wanted to see if it is best to use grower feed and the side dish of free choice oyster shells for calcium. Or If I should also get a bag of layer feed and put as an option along with the grower feed. Not sure if the chickens is this an option. Also once I move to layer feed should I still put a dish of oyster shells available as well?
It is amazing to watch my girls who get a lot of free ranging time and see the two layers actually head to the hen house and sit in the nest box section. I put a couple of golf balls in the nesting box and they do lay next to them now. The first two soft eggs were laid in the pen.
Rhode Island Red and Golden Sex Link have started to lay already. It isn't consistent on the amount of eggs I get each day but usually 2. The have just started laying as of Monday this week. The first eggs from each of these was very soft and hardly no shell. I immediately got some oyster shell and put it in a dish in their coop for free choice. Only these two have been eating some of the oyster shell while the others are not interested. Have noticed that the next round of eggs were normal ( small but had a hard shell ) did find one other soft egg but now each of them has laid over 3 solid eggs.
My question is I still have a large bag of grower pellets which i am feeding them. Will it be okay to keep them on the grower feed and with the side disk of oyster shells for those which want it. I plan on moving to layer pellets once I notice all of them are laying which could be awhile. I have heard most chickens can be over 24 weeks old before they start laying.
The other 3 are Black Australorp, Amerucana and Buff Orpington ( she is starting to make more noise now and might start laying soon - maybe ).
Anyway wanted to see if it is best to use grower feed and the side dish of free choice oyster shells for calcium. Or If I should also get a bag of layer feed and put as an option along with the grower feed. Not sure if the chickens is this an option. Also once I move to layer feed should I still put a dish of oyster shells available as well?
It is amazing to watch my girls who get a lot of free ranging time and see the two layers actually head to the hen house and sit in the nest box section. I put a couple of golf balls in the nesting box and they do lay next to them now. The first two soft eggs were laid in the pen.
