Is there a downside to putting a light in the coop for the winter months?

[cargilelove]

From what I understand if I put a light on a timer and give the girls a few extra hours they will produce more eggs through the winter. I'm wondering if there is any risks? Will it mess with the girls natural instinct? Any info would be great!! Thanks!!!!

 

[Ridgerunner]

We all have our different goals and reasons for doing things. Adding light can kick start young pullets coming into laying age to start to lay and it can delay the molt so hens continue to lay. Perfectly legitimate reasons for extra lights in my opinion, especially if you are selling eggs and you want to keep your customers happy.

I personally choose to not add lights. I always have pullets which tend to skip the molt and continue to lay those small eggs all winter so it’s not like I’m without eggs for my use. My main goal is not eggs anyway, it’s meat plus I like to play with genetics. The eggs are just a nice sideline with most of them being given away to a food bank or sold at church with the money donated.

Chickens do not lay continuously from first egg until they die of old age, even if kept under lights. Each individual can be different but for a flock there is a definite curve where laying builds up to a peak, stays there for a bit, then starts to drop off. That’s number of eggs plus egg quality. An example of egg quality is that the whites can get runny. Hatchability can drop. That’s why commercial egg operations are forced with a decision when productivity of quality eggs drops. They either force a molt or replace the laying flock when profitability drops enough. Normally this is after maybe 11 to 12 months of continuous laying. Another advantage of them molting is that the eggs are usually noticeably larger after an adult molt.

Most hens will go through a molt or mini-molt after 11 or 12 months anyway. They need the time off to recharge and renew their body and store up nutrients and pigments they need for egg laying. Many people that add lights through the winter to keep them laying experience a drop in egg production in summer and blame it on high heat. Don’t get me wrong, high heat can cause a drop in egg production, but sometimes that is just the hens taking some time off to refresh their bodies. You can get extra egg production in the winter by adding lights but you just might pay for it during the summer.

It’s a personal decision. I’m not trying to say that my way is right and everything else is wrong for everybody. I think it does help to have some facts to base that decision on.

Good luck whichever way you decide.

 

[cargilelove]

Just like everything in life.... I am a firm believer that nature does what it needs to do because that's inherently the way it works best. Thanks for the comments. It really mirrors what my instincts were telling me. : )

Thanks!!

 

[WalkingOnSunshine]

Some university research-backed links for those of you interested in lighting for poultry. Very interesting reads.
http://umaine.edu/publications/2227e/
http://www.sp.uconn.edu/~mdarre/poultrypages/light_inset.html

 

[GaryDean26]

One of my ecclesiastical leaders used an analogy on artificial light in production flocks about 2 years ago that really got my attention. He had studied this in depth (Phd thesis type depth). He said that researcher have found that laying around the clock all year long fatigues hen and they burn out really quick. The average age of a chicken in the US is 10 months old. If you want to rotate your layers every year then lighting will maximize your production. The alternative is investing in birds breed for longevity. Heritage breeds that are built right and breed for steady production over a long life span lay for 6+ years. I heard of a Hungarian Yellow hen that lives in Canada that is 10 years old and still laying 13 eggs a month.

I also know of a local 4H boy that kept one pen on artificial light one on natural lighting last winter. He was able to increase production on the lighted pen, but because he is more into chicken for pets, show, breeding his family decided to use natural light to give the hens the rejuvenation that they require to keep their feathers in top condition, increase the vitality of hatching eggs, produce thicker egg shells, etc.

in short: Pros to artificial light are increased winter production, Cons are hen suffer from high stress.

 

[donrae]

Fire. Fire is a big risk. Burnt to death hens won't lay at all

 

[Cindy in PA]

I have been lighting my coop from August 15th until May 15th for 20 years. I started lighting because the article in Organic Gardening in 1993 told me to do it & told me everything else I needed to know for chickens. My chickens have always molted & taken their turns at "resting" in their second fall even with lighting. I never understood the comments that lighting keeps chickens from molting. I have never found that to be true. They molted on schedule & the light was there for the ones that were still laying. Chickens indeed are born with all the eggs they will ever have, but so is every other female in the food chain & very few ever "run out" including humans. I have had 8 year old chickens laying a few eggs a week, even though they laid like gangbusters in their first 2 years and were hatchery stock. This is just my experience, so everyone has to make their own decision on lighting.

 

[WalkingOnSunshine]

In my experience the down sides are the following

less frozen water in the coop
less loss of chickens due to freezing to death
and more eggs in the winter, in fact my hens lay consistantly year round


hope that helps

Where are you and under what circumstances have you had chickens freeze to death? Or are you just speculating? BYC has members that keep chickens in Alaska at -50 F, and they do not freeze to death. There is a big difference between adding light to increase daylength and adding heat bulbs. I do not advocate heat bulbs. Let your chickens acclimate to the weather change gradually with the changing of the seasons and they'll be just fine. We get down around -20F for at least a few days every winter and we don't even get frostbite on the white Leghorns.

I have been lighting my coop from August 15th until May 15th for 20 years. I started lighting because the article in Organic Gardening in 1993 told me to do it & told me everything else I needed to know for chickens. My chickens have always molted & taken their turns at "resting" in their second fall even with lighting. I never understood the comments that lighting keeps chickens from molting. I have never found that to be true. They molted on schedule & the light was there for the ones that were still laying. Chickens indeed are born with all the eggs they will ever have, but so is every other female in the food chain & very few ever "run out" including humans. I have had 8 year old chickens laying a few eggs a week, even though they laid like gangbusters in their first 2 years and were hatchery stock. This is just my experience, so everyone has to make their own decision on lighting.

I agree, my hens moult on schedule. We then use lighting to bring them back into lay sooner. Lighting does not stop them from moulting.

The argument that "chickens are born with all the eggs they will ever lay" so don't light them or they'll burn out faster is specious. The fact is true, but they are born with many thousands more eggs than they could ever lay, just like humans.

Chickens evolved nearer the equator than most of us live, so in their natural habitat they would not see these sharp dips in daylight hours that we see in the northern hemisphere. Contrary to it not being natural, giving them extra lighting is more natural than them not laying eggs all winter.

 

[WalkingOnSunshine]

If you don't leave the light on in the winter then the hens may lay a year or two longer. It's good to let them have their rest during the winter, because laying eggs is very hard and they shouldn't be doing it all through the year. hope this helps

This depends a lot on your management scenario. Many of us do not keep chickens until the end of their natural life. You're going to get the same total number of eggs over a hen's life whether you light them or not--but you'll get far more of them in the first two/three years if you use lights. Since we sell our hens in their second or third year depending on breed, it makes absolute sense to supplement light.

Also, the "shouldn't be doing it all through the year" is very subjective. I've yet to see an actual research-based article that says this. Chickens evolved in the tropics, where there are more hours of light in the winter. My chickens don't lay eggs all through the year--they moult in the fall and take a break for up to five weeks. That seems like more than enough break time.

 

[Ridgerunner]

This is a quote from Chicken Chick’s blog. The link is in Post #40 in this thread to give proper credit to Indigosands for sharing it. I’ll give the link again for those that don’t want to go back and find post #40.

As for her "lifetime" supply of eggs, she is born with the number of possible ova (yolks) already set. These number in the hundreds of thousands, and would take decades of daily egg production to deplete. A hen will stop laying because of old age (and therefore produce less eggs in her life) long before she would ever run out of ova to produce eggs.

http://www.the-chicken-chick.com/2011/09/supplemental-light-in-coop-why-how.html

As you can see, a hen’s lifetime supply of possible ova is in the hundreds of thousands. Let’s do some rough math. At 365 days a year and one egg a day, it would take about 3 years for her to lay 1000 eggs. Assuming the lower range of only 100,000 ova to start with (it actually said a few hundred thousand) it would take about 300 years for the hen to run out of potential yolks. That’s quite a few decades. I really don’t think a lighting program is going to cause her to run out of yolks.