At what age do you usually retire a layer?

[BettyR]

Quote:
Thank you!!! That should do the trick.

 

[Justina1968]

My Mom and Grandma used to pick an old hen out of the flock and wring their neck right there and put them straight into the gumbo pot. My aunt used to cage several of her older hens for a couple of weeks before they went into the freezer.

My problem is I have a fairly large flock of mostly free range hens and they all look alike to me. My present flock is all the same age because we started over when we moved to this new house but I'm about to add younger chicks into the mix. How am I going to tell who is old and who is young?

Whenever we get chicks we leg band them with their birth date and breed. We just write the same info on their larger bands when they need to be changed. My friend will designate a certain color band per year since she retires and buys new chicks every year. Write the info in your chicken book so you know what color to look for.