How Long do chickens lay eggs before their worn out?

[gritsar]

digitS' :

The process of producing cells from which an egg develops ceases at about the time of hatching.

In other words, the number of "potential eggs" is the set at the time of hatch. Isn't that what I said?

 

[Akane]

Could it be that chickens have been bred to lay well for a year or two and then drop off in laying?

I don't think it's just that humans have bred them to be like that. In the wild the birds probably had a high chance of being eaten in the first couple years so it's best to produce the largest numbers before that. Humans probably just kept that going by culling older hens when they slowed down laying.

The point I got was even if there is a set number of eggs the number is so high that there is no way they can come even close to using them up. That would mean it shouldn't matter if you put lights on or not as far as number of eggs the hen has left to lay. I still think the stress on the hen laying year round might make at least some of them stop laying sooner.​

 

[hensonly]

Quote:
Hope that's not cast in stone - I had one laying soft shelled eggs regularly - and she was only 5 months old!!!!

I gave the girls yogurt daily and that seems to have worked - and yes, at 9 months they're still laying!

 

[digitS']

Quote:
That's really the point I was trying to make. Hens don't "run out" of eggs. It is not as tho' they lay:

Year 1 thru 5 = 500 eggs total
stop or,

Year 1 thru 2 = 500 eggs total
stop

That may very well be how it goes but they stop because of hormone deficiencies, infections, stress, etc.

Steve
edited to add: And it isn't likely to be a full stop anyway. I had a 7 year old bantam that would lay several eggs each year.