Chickens suddenly stopped laying for 3 months?

[Mother of Chaos]

Please note: Toying around with their light exposure, and forcing summer, will drastically shorten their chicken lifespan, and possibly increase chances of reproductive issues, I know this from raising many pet quail indoors, and accidentally thinking that having the lights on whenever I needed them was fine, poor birdies.

I do realize that this is not a good long-term practice, and I noted that above. Do you have references that doing this for one season “will drastically shorten their chicken lifespan”?

I’m sorry about your quail. I’ve never met any quail raisers, but they are cute little guys.

 

[WildNectarine]

I do realize that this is not a good long-term practice, and I noted that above. Do you have references that doing this for one season “will drastically shorten their chicken lifespan”?

I’m sorry about your quail. I’ve never met any quail raisers, but they are cute little guys.

Oh, yes they are, very sweet animals when you get to know them; But, you do have me there, I don’t have any outside references other than experience, before I knew how light affected hormones and such, my hens usually all died from things like prolapses, much faster than my roosters; could never figure out what I was doing wrong!

 

[NatJ]

I am aware most breeds take a winter break, but they haven't layed for the entire Autumn already. If they take winter off, they won't have layed for 6 months. How long do they usually take off?

The days are still getting shorter. I would not expect eggs until sometime after the days get longer again.

Once the hours of daylight are increasing, some hens will immediately start getting ready to lay eggs (which takes a few weeks), while other hens will wait for even longer days before they start that process.

So I'd say you have at least another month to wait, quite possibly two months, maybe longer depending on the individual chickens.

 

[Mother of Chaos]

Oh, yes they are, very sweet animals when you get to know them; But, you do have me there, I don’t have any outside references other than experience, before I knew how light affected hormones and such, my hens usually all died from things like prolapses, much faster than my roosters; could never figure out what I was doing wrong!

That had to be so upsetting! I’m sorry.

I should have clarified better: I only pointed out the option of lights because OP’s flock had already had their winter early, so to speak. The practice of forcing year-round laying to maximize egg production at the expense of hen health, is horrifying to me.