Making Lemonade [Selective Culling Project - very long term]

[U_Stormcrow]

We have a new (and as yet unidentified) layer. Found an egg this AM laying on the dirt in the pasture. Not event the start of a bowl/nest beneath it. Also slightly undersized compared to average.

Typical signs of a new layer, meaning past time to do a headcount reduction. Seems to early to to be from the early-May hatching, but there are no alternative options of older hatch dates.

 

[Sally PB]

Seems to early to to be from the early-May hatching, but there are no alternative options of older hatch dates.

Wow! Yeah, that is early.

 

[NatJ]

We have a new (and as yet unidentified) layer. Found an egg this AM laying on the dirt in the pasture. Not event the start of a bowl/nest beneath it. Also slightly undersized compared to average.

Typical signs of a new layer, meaning past time to do a headcount reduction. Seems to early to to be from the early-May hatching, but there are no alternative options of older hatch dates.

How old are the next-youngest? Could one of them have taken a ridiculous amount of time to begin laying? (Not likely at this time of year, but maybe worth considering.)

Or it could be a one-off from one of the older layers, unless you find more over the next days and weeks. I've had times when a hen laid a smaller-than-usual egg, sometimes in odd places rather than a nest. It's not terribly common, but pullets laying at 3.5 months are not very common either.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

Yes, the above seems more plausible. Otherwise we are what, 15 weeks on one of the layers??? Seems wrong.

Must be an older hen making a mistake.

Next oldest batch are from last year - this would be WAY late. Even for Dark Brahma or SLW.

 

[SourRoses]

Yes, the above seems more plausible. Otherwise we are what, 15 weeks on one of the layers??? Seems wrong.

Must be an older hen making a mistake.

Next oldest batch are from last year - this would be WAY late. Even for Dark Brahma or SLW.

I agree it could be either, and sometimes mature hens with odd anatomy or hormones can have a sporadic reproductive schedule.

Also, I once witnessed a mature layer refused the favored nestbox by a broody, just give up and start chowing down at the feeder, and out pops an egg. She seemed to not even notice it, perhaps it was almost out when she gave up on the box. lol

 

[Logar]

 

[U_Stormcrow]

Little to update. Only getting 4 eggs a day or so right now. Pasture looks like a feather pillow fight. Found my fourth hidden nest in a week. 12 eggs in the first, 15 in the second, 4 and 4 in the last two. Seems every time I find one they start another.

Its not enough eggs to start a new incubation, and I am feeding too many males. Just have too much else gong on to spend another day culling - though the weather is beautiful for it. Maybe Saturday work on the greenhouse and redoing the hen house (half "hoop coop" about 12x20 via 5 cattle panels, a handy wall, and some 9 mil plastic sheeting). Then take down the existing raised hen house the goats have destroyed, reuse the metal roofing and some of the 2x4 structure to do the open sides of the coop.

I've mentioned I have too many males? Sunday head count reduction.

Yeah.

Same for goats. But that's another thread...

 

[NatJ]

Found my fourth hidden nest in a week. 12 eggs in the first, 15 in the second, 4 and 4 in the last two. Seems every time I find one they start another.

Have you tried putting a few fake eggs in the nest when you take the real ones? Sometimes that works to keep them using the same nest.

Of course "fake eggs" can also be golf balls, smooth rocks, leftover plastic eggs from last Easter, wood eggs from a craft store, etc.

 

[LaurenRitz]

Have you tried putting a few fake eggs in the nest when you take the real ones? Sometimes that works to keep them using the same nest.

Of course "fake eggs" can also be golf balls, smooth rocks, leftover plastic eggs from last Easter, wood eggs from a craft store, etc.

My birds will kick anything out of the best that doesn't look like a real egg, and the fake eggs dissapear. I found one half gnawed in the garage.

It works well, as long as they last.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

Have you tried putting a few fake eggs in the nest when you take the real ones? Sometimes that works to keep them using the same nest.

Of course "fake eggs" can also be golf balls, smooth rocks, leftover plastic eggs from last Easter, wood eggs from a craft store, etc.

Yes. Something ate them.

and since I'm ripping down the existing hen house (what the goats haven't broken, anyways), I'm not investing a lot of time in retraining them to go to a place that will shorlty cease to exist.