Bit of a weird one here.
I've six hens of various breeds- two rhode island reds, a bluebell, a marbar, a buff-barred-rock and one that is potentially an astrolorp.
They have total free range of our garden year round, about an acre, and are free to forage etc. on top of their daily feed of layers pellets.
They're all relatively healthy birds (had a bit of a scare with bluebell last year but she's fine now) and they all get wormed by hand once a month.
The problem we have is that they lay almost year round, including through the winter. They don't stop until around April, which is when they all gradually stop laying eggs for a couple of weeks or so.
I want to try and fix their annual cycle so that this break is during the winter, so that they have more energy for bad weather and the like as winters here are very unpredictable and there is less insect life to forage for.
Any ideas?
I've six hens of various breeds- two rhode island reds, a bluebell, a marbar, a buff-barred-rock and one that is potentially an astrolorp.
They have total free range of our garden year round, about an acre, and are free to forage etc. on top of their daily feed of layers pellets.
They're all relatively healthy birds (had a bit of a scare with bluebell last year but she's fine now) and they all get wormed by hand once a month.
The problem we have is that they lay almost year round, including through the winter. They don't stop until around April, which is when they all gradually stop laying eggs for a couple of weeks or so.
I want to try and fix their annual cycle so that this break is during the winter, so that they have more energy for bad weather and the like as winters here are very unpredictable and there is less insect life to forage for.
Any ideas?