'Odd' (to me) behavior... any insights?

[rbc-bow-chicka]

I have a flock of chickens which are the product of ISA browns hens and what is likely some unknown kind of brown sexlink rooster. They are just over a year old. It is kind of cool how their coloring turned out, which im sure has nothing to do with this.

They lay some really big honkin' eggs. One gave me a whopper a couple of weeks ago. I have to box them separately. Last week, I noticed one of them kind of 'isolating'.... looking a little hunched up with her eyes closed. 'Uh oh!! SICK CHICKEN!!' Checked later. Alas no. No sick chicken. Same thing happened a couple of days ago- different girl... went to check on her, she was fine.

I have an older girl in the next coop acting 'weird' this morning.... so I'm checking on her later....and with any luck, she is also fine.

Do some chickens just look.... Off?... before laying? I have *never* noticed this with any of the other girls and I stare at my chickens more than most chicken tenders, I fear.

 

[fluffycrow]

If they've laid eggs after having that sick day, then it's not egg binding. My ISA browns would start doing this about 6 months before passing, but usually at around three to three and a half years old. That egg doesn't look right to me; you might be dealing with early reproductive issues, the most common killer for these production mixes

I've had my other breeds having "off days", but it was nowhere near as evident as it is with the ISA browns

 

[thecatumbrella]

Do some chickens just look.... Off?... before laying?

I have super limited experience, but I would say yes. One of my 3 layers just had a harder time than the other two, but once the egg popped out she would be back to her normal shenanigans. Definitely something to keep an eye on, since she might need assistance one day.

 

[rbc-bow-chicka]

If they've laid eggs after having that sick day, then it's not egg binding. My ISA browns would start doing this about 6 months before passing, but usually at around three to three and a half years old. That egg doesn't look right to me; you might be dealing with early reproductive issues, the most common killer for these production mixes

I've had my other breeds having "off days", but it was nowhere near as evident as it is with the ISA browns

I had to look back at my records. The ISAs are cooking along with no problems yet. We got them as chicks in Jan 2021.

The girls that are acting off, they were hatched last spring as an experiment to see what we would get (because sexlinks do not breed true i was wondering what these would look like...maybe reverting back to what parent stock were. There's variations of white and gold amongst 5 and one solid white).

Them acting 'off' disappears with the laying of an egg...so thats good. But I'm still watching those 2 to look for any patterns.

I expected the ISAs to start showing problems and they are only 2, but these daughters... if the 'sexlink' is bred out of them, do they have the same problems? That didn't occur to me until now.

That was the whopper egg for sure. I get 5 to 6 eggs a day out of the 6 girls and at least 2 do not fit nicely into a carton, so they tend to get stuck or broken.

 

[Ridgerunner]

I expected the ISAs to start showing problems and they are only 2, but these daughters... if the 'sexlink' is bred out of them, do they have the same problems?

ISA Browns are a four way commercial hybrid bred to lay a lot of Grade A large eggs. They are bred to very efficiently convert feed to eggs. With their smaller bodies they do not need to use that much of what they eat for body maintenance so more can go to making eggs.

It's not the "sex-link" part that causes many problems, it is being bred to lay a lot of fairly large eggs for their body size. Because they are a hybrid they are not going to create more ISA Browns when you hatch their eggs, even if you use an ISA Brown rooster. Their chicks are still going to inherit a lot of the genetics to lay a lot of large eggs. Out of curiosity, what breed of rooster did you breed with them? That may or may not be significant.

What are you feeding them? Commercial operations generally feed about a 16% protein feed since ISA Browns are so efficient at converting feed to eggs. Any higher percent protein could cause larger eggs that might possibly cause laying problems. I don't know if that is causing part of your problem or not.

 

[MarlaMac]

I would think any chicken laying that size of an egg on a regular basis would look "off" before laying. Just the size of the egg would probably produce anxiety in the hen knowing she must pass that.

 

[rbc-bow-chicka]

ISA Browns are a four way commercial hybrid bred to lay a lot of Grade A large eggs. They are bred to very efficiently convert feed to eggs. With their smaller bodies they do not need to use that much of what they eat for body maintenance so more can go to making eggs.

It's not the "sex-link" part that causes many problems, it is being bred to lay a lot of fairly large eggs for their body size. Because they are a hybrid they are not going to create more ISA Browns when you hatch their eggs, even if you use an ISA Brown rooster. Their chicks are still going to inherit a lot of the genetics to lay a lot of large eggs. Out of curiosity, what breed of rooster did you breed with them? That may or may not be significant.

What are you feeding them? Commercial operations generally feed about a 16% protein feed since ISA Browns are so efficient at converting feed to eggs. Any higher percent protein could cause larger eggs that might possibly cause laying problems. I don't know if that is causing part of your problem or not.

The roo was/is an extra chick we got in an order from Murray McMurray with some meat birds a few years ago. He is white with black/brown irregular marks in his feathers. Looking through their catalog, it looked like he could be an Amberlink or some such breed.

We feed 16% pellets along with greens from the garden about once a week or so.

I think this might be the last time I do any experimenting of this nature!! I did not consider that the wonky genetics would stay present. The daughters are in with an extra RIR that I needed a place for. These girls though, are much bigger than their mothers. They are in the coop next door to them and the size difference between mom/daughters is startling.

 

[rbc-bow-chicka]

I would think any chicken laying that size of an egg on a regular basis would look "off" before laying. Just the size of the egg would probably produce anxiety in the hen knowing she must pass that.

Yeahhhh.... I wondered how that one went down and out. Heavens to Betsey!

Thankfully the other eggs are just.... well.... I'd say extra large to jumbo. It has been so long since I've bought eggs, I can't guess without weighing them.

 

[Ridgerunner]

The roo was/is an extra chick we got in an order from Murray McMurray with some meat birds a few years ago. He is white with black/brown irregular marks in his feathers. Looking through their catalog, it looked like he could be an Amberlink or some such breed.

You don't know what that rooster contributed genetically. He could be an Amberlink but I suspect he could be some type of red sex link rooster. Many of them are colored like that. Extra chicks like that are usually males.

We feed 16% pellets along with greens from the garden about once a week or so.

Nothing wrong with that at all.