Preventing August-born pullets from maturing early?

[Ridgerunner]

I'm not going to argue against adding light in the winter. We all have different goals and need to reach them in different ways. What I will argue for is that the laying hens eventually need some down time unless you just keep them for a year and a half or so of laying and then get rid of them.

Eggs get bigger after a molt, so there can be some benefits to having them molt.

After a length of time of solid laying, the egg shells get lighter if you have brown egg layers. That by itself is not a huge problem, but it may be a sign that the egg quality can drop. Also the number of eggs they lay will start to taper off. My pullets that start laying in the fall usually continue to lay throughout the winter and all the next season until they go into a molt. I don't provide any extra light. Before that molt, I sometimes notice a slight drop in egg numbers and the eggs just don't look as nice. I can't say I've seen a huge increase of problems with the eggs, no additional blood spots or meat spots, no weird sized or shaped eggs, nothing like that. The drop in number is not that noticeable to me either, but I don't have three to five houses with 5,000 laying hens in each. With those numbers, it might get real noticeable.

The commercial operations keep their hens on artificial lighting to control when they lay and when they molt. The commercial operations do not keep hens laying indefinitely, but eventually either allow them to molt or replace them. If egg production, either in quality or numbers, did not drop enough for it to be an economic issue, the commercial operations would just keep them laying indefinitely instead of paying for feed for nonproductive molting hens or nonproductive chicks growing to become layers.

 

[Victoria-nola]

I appreciate the input, Ridgerunner. Well here's my situation: I'm an organic gardener and grow food (lots of greens) year-round, am an amateur herbalist/energy-worker for decades and prefer nutritional supplements to pharmaceutical drugs. I started thinking I needed to supplement light because people say things like 'you will stop getting eggs in winter if you don't," and that worried me. I'd definitely rather not. I have 7 hens and a roo, trade veggies from my garden and hope to trade eggs, so there is no large-scale operation or great economic imperative for me. I'd rather the girls be on a natural rhythm. I expect they'll die of old age-- although I have a neighbor who will do any butchering I might ask for. I got Easter Eggers (called Ameracaunas) for several reasons, one of them being they are reputed NOT to fall off on egg production so steeply after 3 years.

Given that is who I am and my situation, it sounds like you're saying I shouldn't worry about supplemental light, and that would be good news for me.

 

[Yonaton]

Quote:
Yes...page one through to the last page.

Like another said, y'all are way over-thinking this stuff.

 

[SIMZ]

I also read that in Storey's and it's been in the back of my mind for a while, too. I have some Sept. chicks and October chicks and had NO IDEA how I was going to control light for them. This puts my mind at ease a bit.

 

[Fred's Hens]

Being in the Big Easy, your latitude is friendly enough on light hours per day. Those of us in the northern latitudes have miserably dark Nov-Feb, with Dec-Jan being the worst at only 8 hours of daylight. Adding a few hours of pre-dawn light, for us, is hardly pushing hens.

Once a pullet is bulked up, at perhaps 22-24 weeks of age, (this being breed dependent), then adding a few hours of pre-dawn light is just fine in my book. The best way to initiate supplemental lighting is to add it 15 minutes per day. Easy to do with most timers as each "tooth" is a 15 minute "click".

Personally, I like the dusk to be natural, allowing the birds to wind down naturally and take their roosts with setting sun. Hens do need rest to function, like all living things.

 

[Victoria-nola]

Yonaton: heh! ok. It does seem really really complex. I was just having this conversation about pet pigs, about how much difference a percentage or two points of protein makes in the diet. Some people act like it's critical, others say it's just not. Well, I wish I'd saved my money then.

Fred: Most people I've heard talk about adding light seem to add it at the end of the day. People who like end of day extra light say so because then the roo doesn't start crowing even earlier. But I love dusk and end of day and would like that to be natural. But anyway, as you say, in New Orleans our shortest day is 11 hours. I'll not add light this year in any case.

Thanks again for your very helpful information.

 

[Frithest]

Victoria-nola, I had the same question also triggered by the same book. My pullets hatched the first week of August, which I think puts them at risk too. But the breeders I got them from said that they'd probably be delayed in starting to lay, so I was surprised to read it might be the opposite. I think I'm just going to let nature run it's course...

 

[Victoria-nola]

Frithest: Yes, I'm definitely just going with natural light. I don't have the capacity to remove light anyway, so I don't actually have much choice. But I'm glad to know that it's not at all standard practice here on BYC.

 

[Frithest]

The funny thing is, I loved that book. I really thought it was a god-send. Now I'm wondering - especially after someone else said the whole thing was worthless. It seemed like the most comprehensive chicken book out there... Oh well. I guess I'll continue to turn to BYC!

 

[Ridgerunner]

I have not read "Storey's" so I won't comment on it's content specifically. We all raise our chickens differently with different goals, different breeds, and in different circumstances. Chickens are pretty adaptable. A lot of different things work, some better in different circumstances than others. I think that is why you get so much conflicting information, so many different things can work.

A lot of the information we use comes from studies paid for by the commercial interests, often performed by students getting their graduate degrees at the land grant universities. These studies are mainly but not always looking at things from the commercial perspective. You can gain a lot from them, but you have to realize the circumstances they are talking about. I'll use feed as an example. The recommendations for Starter, then Grower, then Developer, then Layer come from maximum efficiency in growing chickens to become healthy layers using commercial laying breeds in commercial housing, with specific schedules of feeding and lighting, with the commercial feed all they eat. We don't raise out chickens that way. We provide treats or allow them to find some of their own food. We don't always follow the exact feeding regimen they use. Ours do fine as long as we don't go overboard. We have happy healthy chickens even if they get a little more or less protein, fiber, fats, vitamins, or minerals than the optimum, most efficient.

Gail Dameron is a recognized chicken expert. She knows a lot more about chickens than I ever will. But she is also a person with her own experiences. She is going to tell her story from her perspective based on what she has seen and knows. It is certainly possible some of her information is not totally accurate for your circumstances, not that it won't work in certain or even most circumstances, but that it gives the impression that other ways might not work or that a specific thing is required. A lot of what works or does not work depends on a lot of other factors. You can't take just one thing and apply it without considering other things.

I try to treat anything I read in any book, no matter who wrote it, just like I treat anything I see on the internet, including this forum. I try to understand where they are coming from, what their circumstances and experiences are, and make some judgment for myself. What works best for someone with four pet hens in a coop and run in a suburban back yard mainly for eggs may be totally different than the best way for someone that free ranges chickens and raises them for meat as well as eggs.

I'll never dismiss anything Gail Dameron writes. I'll try to see how it fits with what I do. And I often fail at this, but I try to not overthink it.