Kind of a long post but looking for advice or insight. Thanks -
We have just moved to a new farm and brought our 15 laying pullets and one rooster with us. They seemed to adjust very well to the new, roomier coop and love roaming around the farm. They are all about 7 months old and have been laying very regularly. We get between 10 and 14 eggs every day, in the nestboxes. They have always been quite good about laying eggs in the nest boxes from the beginning.
THEN - we added 8 more hens that we think are a bit older than the others. All is well among the group after a bit of pecking order fighting. All the new girls have vents that indicate they are laying. And i saw one lay the other day.
NOW - the # of eggs has drastically gone down. With 23 egg laying birds you'd think our # of eggs would go up but it is going down. We only get about 10 eggs a day now. We found a few in an odd place outside so kept them in the coop today until about noon. By then there were only 6 eggs!
So while it is possible they are laying in other places around the farm, i am wondering what else could be the culprit. Specifically i was wondering if it is the diminishing light that is doing it. Seems like we have about 12 hours of sunshine and i thought that might be enough. Should we add lights now? When do most of you that add artificial light start?
Any thoughts on what it could be?
We have just moved to a new farm and brought our 15 laying pullets and one rooster with us. They seemed to adjust very well to the new, roomier coop and love roaming around the farm. They are all about 7 months old and have been laying very regularly. We get between 10 and 14 eggs every day, in the nestboxes. They have always been quite good about laying eggs in the nest boxes from the beginning.
THEN - we added 8 more hens that we think are a bit older than the others. All is well among the group after a bit of pecking order fighting. All the new girls have vents that indicate they are laying. And i saw one lay the other day.
NOW - the # of eggs has drastically gone down. With 23 egg laying birds you'd think our # of eggs would go up but it is going down. We only get about 10 eggs a day now. We found a few in an odd place outside so kept them in the coop today until about noon. By then there were only 6 eggs!
So while it is possible they are laying in other places around the farm, i am wondering what else could be the culprit. Specifically i was wondering if it is the diminishing light that is doing it. Seems like we have about 12 hours of sunshine and i thought that might be enough. Should we add lights now? When do most of you that add artificial light start?
Any thoughts on what it could be?