Arizona Chickens

[igorsMistress]

A rooster could warn them faster than we could run out there. We keep an eye on them via cameras but I still have to get through two locked security doors to reach them in an emergency, I hate that.

Yeah but without a rooster the girls do that themselves. And even with a rooster they don’t see everything and the whole flock watches really. It’s a community effort.

 

[Happy Novogens]

How long do your hens lay eggs? Last year my hens laid eggs all through the winter. I had been warned that production would go down, so I had started hoarding them but it ended up that production never slowed.

This year, only my 2 youngest are laying still. They lay every day. My EE's haven't laid an egg for weeks and weeks. A couple others only lay about once a week at best. My oldest hens are just 2 1/2 years old. (hatched summer of 2022)

 

[EmmaDonovan]

We're still getting 8+ eggs per day from 12 hens. They are 9-10 months old. They are molting, too, nothing dramatic, they all look a wee bit scruffy and there are feathers everywhere but no one has bald spots or anything like that. They seem to be warm enough at night as they're sleeping in kind of a spread-out group but not all huddled together.

Most of my friends here who have hens say they lay regularly the first two years, right on through the summer and winter, and the lay rate typically tapers off after that but that's due more to age.

Some of them keep lights on in the coop during winter. I'm not sure that's necessary since we have 10+ hours of daylight even in winter. I'd rather let the hens' bodies do whatever they do naturally. If nature decides they need a rest they can have it. I've been scrambling and freezing raw eggs just in case they start laying fewer eggs and we need some stored as backup.

Our summers are 14+ hours of daylight. Maybe since the total number of daylight hours doesn't change all that much, it doesn't signal a big change in laying, either?

 

[BenisonsChickns]

How long do your hens lay eggs? Last year my hens laid eggs all through the winter. I had been warned that production would go down, so I had started hoarding them but it ended up that production never slowed.

This year, only my 2 youngest are laying still. They lay every day. My EE's haven't laid an egg for weeks and weeks. A couple others only lay about once a week at best. My oldest hens are just 2 1/2 years old. (hatched summer of 2022)

I’ve got 10 hens, 4 are only 15 weeks so their not laying yet then out of the other 6 hens that are all 7 months old 5 are still laying and 1 my olive egger hasn’t laid in 2 weeks now.

 

[igorsMistress]

How long do your hens lay eggs? Last year my hens laid eggs all through the winter. I had been warned that production would go down, so I had started hoarding them but it ended up that production never slowed.

This year, only my 2 youngest are laying still. They lay every day. My EE's haven't laid an egg for weeks and weeks. A couple others only lay about once a week at best. My oldest hens are just 2 1/2 years old. (hatched summer of 2022)

That sounds about right. The first year they seem to lay through winter if they are summer chicks but the following year they take their break. It’s a good thing, their little bodies can use a break. I hoard in fall before my girls quit but share a lot in spring/summer.

Daylight hours impact laying, but the newbies haven’t quite worked out all the kinks and may lay anyway.

 

[BenisonsChickns]

That sounds about right. The first year they seem to lay through winter if they are summer chicks but the following year they take their break. It’s a good thing, their little bodies can use a break. I hoard in fall before my girls quit but share a lot in spring/summer.

Daylight hours impact laying, but the newbies haven’t quite worked out all the kinks and may lay anyway.

When you say hoard in the fall, how do you store your eggs what’s the time frame that their good that you go by?

 

[Happy Novogens]

I hoarded last Fall. I just kept the bloom on the eggs and put them in the refrig just because it was the most convenient place to store them. I ended up having 21 - dozen eggs at one point!

By Spring I was rolling in eggs, lol! I gave some away and we ate a ton. They'll last a few months easily and probably still be more fresh than store bought eggs.

 

[EmmaDonovan]

What do y'all like to give as protein boosters while your chickens are molting? I decided to try some salmon, they've never had it before. I made a boiled mash of scratch (the good kind) and oatmeal and added some salmon to it. Not too much in case they didn't like it or something.

Holy cow I have never seen them eat like that. The entire flock went completely silent. No chattering, nothing. Just eat eat eat eat eat. Their world dissolved into salmon-ness.

I'll be making more of that!

 

[Happy Novogens]

I've given them canned catfood for protein.

 

[igorsMistress]

When you say hoard in the fall, how do you store your eggs what’s the time frame that their good that you go by?

I store them unwashed in wire baskets that hang from a wall in my kitchen for two or three months. I have a system of rotation so the oldest get used first. You can also freeze them, which is what I do for holiday baking. The easiest way I’ve found is to freeze them by recipe and store that way. You can also try water glassing them; I’ve never tried that method but I’ve read about it quite a bit. It seems like a pain in the butt, but if it was a matter of preserving because we might not eat otherwise I know enough about it to do it.