Chickens stopped laying after... (highly probable due to low nutrition)

[hysop]

Update:

Chickens started laying after exactly 3 weeks. It was most likely due to not feeding them enough. I was used to my flock of White Leghorns that adding a bunch of different breeds and feeding them the same amounts per hen did not work well with the other breeds.

I am switching to free feeding and will begin to slowly transition back to an all White Leghorn flock.

Thank you all who commented and helped me come to this conclusion. Not all chickens are the same! haha My poor chickens.

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Original Post:

Hubbies!

My husband fed some wet dairy goat feed to my chickens Saturday evening. By the time I noticed it was too late. It was A LOT according to him, half a 5 gal bucket I think.

It wasn’t moldy, just got wet from the rain that same day.

Chickens are acting fine but no eggs. Today is day 3 of no eggs. Their poops are huge with a white cap on em. I read that’s normal.

Is there something I need to do or just let it run its course til they get all that out of their system?

I already explained to my husband why we can’t do that ever again and he knows now too after seeing zero eggs for 3 days.

Needless to say, chickens are my thing not his

Thank you for all and any advice.

 

[Texasclucker]

try feeding them dragon fruit

 

[Texasclucker]

i know it sounds dumb but i once fed my Sebright some and she started laying alot

 

[NatJ]

Chickens are acting fine but no eggs. Today is day 3 of no eggs.

Is there any chance the chickens are laying their eggs somewhere else?
Maybe rats or a dog or some other animal taking the eggs?
A person stealing the eggs, or playing a prank?

I would not expect the goat feed to affect the chickens that way, so I'm just trying to check other possibilities in case you overlooked something.

If the chickens really do seem fine, and you cannot find any other explanation for the lack of eggs, you will probably have to just wait until they start laying again.

 

[hysop]

Is there any chance the chickens are laying their eggs somewhere else?
Maybe rats or a dog or some other animal taking the eggs?
A person stealing the eggs, or playing a prank?

I would not expect the goat feed to affect the chickens that way, so I'm just trying to check other possibilities in case you overlooked something.

If the chickens really do seem fine, and you cannot find any other explanation for the lack of eggs, you will probably have to just wait until they start laying again.

Yes. They’re in a contained run with netting over it. Plenty of space. Definitely no eggs in sight. I’ll double check their coop tomorrow but I went from 7-11 eggs a day to literally zero right after that.

I’ll post an update when they do start laying for informational purposes I guess.

Maybe because it was dairy goat feed for lactating goats instead of regular old goat feed

Thankfully they all do seem normal. And majority are on their first year of laying so it’s not that they’ve slowed down due to age.

 

[Dephora]

Goat pellets have a high amount of minerals and salts in them that are great for goats and very very bad for chickens. Fed over a long period of time it can cause issue, but I have never heard of feeding it one time causing chickens to stop laying completely. Do they have access to their regular feed as usual? Was the goat feed medicated at all?

 

[alwaystj9]

Rain will sometimes affect my hens laying, usually halves it the day after. Strange about the 3 days. Keep us posted!

 

[hysop]

Goat pellets have a high amount of minerals and salts in them that are great for goats and very very bad for chickens. Fed over a long period of time it can cause issue, but I have never heard of feeding it one time causing chickens to stop laying completely. Do they have access to their regular feed as usual? Was the goat feed medicated at all?

Goat feed was not medicated. We don’t free feed. I give them a certain amount of 16% layer feed daily and have done that for months and no issues, constant egg laying. I’ve tried free feeding (a year or so ago) but they ate all the time for the same amount of eggs so I stopped.

This is the first time they’ve ever gotten that dairy goat feed.

They are penned up (going on close to a year) and no longer free range due to my 1 year old puppy thinking they’re food but their square footage is more than my own house sqft so they have plenty of space.

I’ll post tomorrow to see if I see any changes. But so far I haven’t been hearing their egg song (which is all day long since I have 18 laying hens). And zero eggs. So we’ll see I guess.

Thankfully we don’t have a shortage of eggs in our refrigerator so we’re not worried on the no-eggs part. We just wanna make sure the chickens are fine. Which they seem to be, thankfully.

 

[Dephora]

Goat feed was not medicated. We don’t free feed. I give them a certain amount of 16% layer feed daily and have done that for months and no issues, constant egg laying. I’ve tried free feeding (a year or so ago) but they ate all the time for the same amount of eggs so I stopped.

This is the first time they’ve ever gotten that dairy goat feed.

They are penned up (going on close to a year) and no longer free range due to my 1 year old puppy thinking they’re food but their square footage is more than my own house sqft so they have plenty of space.

I’ll post tomorrow to see if I see any changes. But so far I haven’t been hearing their egg song (which is all day long since I have 18 laying hens). And zero eggs. So we’ll see I guess.

Thankfully we don’t have a shortage of eggs in our refrigerator so we’re not worried on the no-eggs part. We just wanna make sure the chickens are fine. Which they seem to be, thankfully.

Hopefully someone can give you some insight into why all 18 hens are no longer laying. No evidence of egg eating? or of a neighbor snatching eggs? lol

 

[hysop]

Hopefully someone can give you some insight into why all 18 hens are no longer laying. No evidence of egg eating? or of a neighbor snatching eggs? lol

no. Our neighbors are pretty far from us that if they ever do come our dog would sound the alarm with her constant barking.

No egg eating since the nest box hay is dry as can be. Nothing sticky.

Hmm I’m now thinking that we did dispatch two cockerels the very next day after feeding them the wet dairy goat feed. Are they on strike for us feeding those two to my dog? They were only 5 weeks old so they weren’t part of their flock.