So how do you stop them from laying????

[Buttercup Chillin]

How do you get them to take a break. Black out, they thought oh, what's going on, down 3 eggs.
They get used to it fast. NO PROBLEMO. They decide to just party anyway but on a lower level of noise in the daytime. Its like they are whispering, what's with that? Now we are up 8 eggs and not all the young ones are laying everyday yet.

There is only 10 hours of daylight here. No additional light. I use a flash light to collect eggs. Buts its warm even at night.

I never planned on keeping breeders longer than 6-8 months. So haven't paid attention to how you "rest" your birds. But now with the Spring Jumbo CO-OP, I figured I might need to keep them and give them a rest. I don't like this. Goes against how I want to raise them. If they don't stop laying pretty soon, I am replacing them after one more F1 hatch. I will then use the F1's for the Spring Jumbo CO-OP.

 

[Robo]

You could try covering their cage with a tarp. I have some hens that got beat up in a cage with no lighting and they lay some, but not much.

 

[Buttercup Chillin]

Quote:
They are darkened. The entire area, that is not all that big, is surrounded by heavy black ground cloth (not home grade, construction grade), that is covered on the outside by another tarp. There is no light in there from late afternoon until morning when, it is very very dim during the day. I have used a flashlight in there in the daytime at times. Sunrise is 7:15 and sunset at 5:25 or something like that. As the sun starts setting and definately at 5PM, I have to use a flashlight it is too dark for me to see anything .

Evidently it is to dark for them to eat. They are not eating at night. This is not good and what I really don't like.

I want them to stop laying completely for a rest. If they are laying at all they are not resting and there is no purpose for this.
Beat up hens, I take in house to intensive care.

From what I can tell they act like they took a partial rest for 1 day, their eggs are now bigger and being laid earlier. Most eggs have been layed before 6 opposed to 9PM. Well, they do the egg size thing from time to time anyway, on their own.

I am beginning to think they are acclimated to this weather here and may not need or want a rest. This is their home base breeding area. They are from local eggs, not shipped from another area. Its very obvious, even to me, that they are from a very old strain. They've been around here for a very long time. That may have something to do with it at any rate.

Remember, you all said change feed they will stop laying, not my girls. Change their pens or move them (done that alot), they will stop laying, not my girls. Change birds in pens, I have only done that to a few of the pens, but not my girls. Change their lighting (added more tarps end of summer to keep the heat off them), not my girls. Its a 110*+ heat index they kept laying.

They have never done what you all said they would. They don't read BYC. Thank goodness, they are bigger than I am supposed to be able to raise them. Being such a newbie and all. So, I think I will just breed them one more time and move them out. I only have so many pens and only want so many.
They have never stopped laying for any reason since they started.