Hens have given up laying.

[blitz1027]

I believe my chickens have gone on strike. I have 3 separate pens for my different breeds of chickens and all of them have all but given up on laying. I have about 20 hens spread out between them and I used to get 9 to 11 eggs a day, but now I'm doing good to get 1 or 2 eggs a day.

It started about 3 or 4 months ago with my brahma pen. I had 2 Polish hens in with them and I moved them. I figured they stopped laying because I messed up they're apple cart. Soon my bantams stopped laying and finally my mixed flock pen stopped laying.

My brahmas laid they're first egg in months yesterday but no one else laid a thing. Does any one know why they would just stop all at once for months? I would really like to put some eggs in the bator.

Don't know if this helps but the breeds I raise are Brahma, Cochin (LF) and Bantam, Welsummer, Silkie and Maran.

I also have a few mismatched hens I got from various places such as a bantam Wyandotte, a Red Sex Link, a couple of Polish and a showgirl.

 

[DianaMallory]

How old are they? Did they molt this past fall? Are you feeding them layer feed?

 

[sumi]

The stress of getting moved probably caused them to stop laying and now the days are short too. Hens need about 14-16 hours of light a day to keep them in production, so that could be an issue.

Other possible reasons could be parasites such as worms/mites, molting or disease. Did you take any precautions against parasites?

 

[blitz1027]

Yes most of them molted a few months back. Most of the bantams are just over a year old. The Brahmas and polish are a couple years old and pretty much everything else is less than a year.

You think that the birds being moved would affect them this long? I've moved birds before and it never really affected them.

Also that shouldn't have had any affect on the bantams because they were never in the same pen.

As far as disease a couple of them bantams have just gotten over fowl pox the Brahmas and the Polish had it last year and I have medicated all of them for it just to be on the safe side.

What would you recommend I check for? They all act completely normal.

 

[sumi]

Fowl pox is another cause, but they should recover and start laying again after about 3 weeks, molting hens do sometimes take a few weeks to recover and stress (from being moved) is another factor. I think a combination of this and the shorter days is to blame.

Age is another factor, how old are your hens?

 

[blitz1027]

Most of my bantams are just over a year. My Brahmas and Polish are about 2 years old. My Marans, Welsummers and LF Cochins are less than a year. Also my Red Sex Link is about about 3 or 4 years old. She was one of my very first chickens