Is Bridgely OK?

[micstrachan]

My Barred rock, Bridgette (aka Bridgey, aka Bridge, aka Bridgely) is my calm, confident, robust girl and will be two years old at the end of this month. She had a long, slow molt, and has been over it for awhile. Her comb color has mostly returned to red, and she even squatted a couple times a couple weeks ago. But I have yet to see an egg from her since fall. Is my Bridgely ok? I don’t mind not having the eggs, but I want her to be healthy. Most of my other girls who molted have come back into lay. Is there any reason for me to be concerned? She has also been making her posted off call a lot lately (the one she made last year when all the pullets came into the coop while she was starting to lay. Any thoughts on this?

 

[Ol Grey Mare]

How old is she? Not really anything to be too concerned about at this point - some birds are slower to return to production than others and we are not yet at the point where daylight hours are at the 12+ hour point.

 

[RanchRichey]

I have a 2 year old EE that went dormant over fall and winter, being in Southern California, we have had an exceptionally warm winter and she started back up several weeks ago and layed a few eggs, then we had a bit of a cold snap and she stopped again. I was concerned because during this time we lost 2 pullets to some un identified illness, but she showed no signs of anything wrong. About 1.5 weeks ago sure enough she started again and is laying every other day or so. Hope yours is just late coming off molt.

 

[micstrachan]

Thanks. She’s almost two years old. I’m in Northern California. Warm, dry winter like you. I have two other 2-yr-olds and one has NEVER molted nor stopped laying. The other had a mini molt last year, and a regular molt this year followed by a head molt a few weeks later. She took a laying break all three times. Two of the pullets who molted this year (and started AFTER Bridge) have come back into lay. Here’s my Bridge a few weeks ago:

 

[RanchRichey]

She's lovely . Good luck! Let us know if she starts up again!

 

[micstrachan]

Yay! My sweet, beautiful Bridgette laid a well formed egg just now. I suspected that may be coming, as she squatted yesterday and has started talking sweetly again. So relieved to have al healthy chickens at the moment, or so it seems!