What kind of bad luck is this?

[Eric Vey]

My family had about a dozen RIR when I was a teenager and don't recall molting being much of a big deal. They did it for a couple of months, egg production maintained about 7 eggs a day and all was well. They took turns molting.

40 years later, I have 3 chickens again, but these came with the house we bought. "Buff Orpington" I was told. Turns out that they were 6+ years old, so I wasn't surprised when they quit laying for 6 months.

I replaced them last year and it's molting time again. The young chickens laid great starting in November and are all slowly molting, just like the old ones did. It's been over 3 months now and nary an egg in sight.

Is this a breed thing or am I being overly unlucky?

 

[chrissynemetz]

How old are your new hens? It's normal for chickens over 18 months old to molt once a year. And egg production does kinda dwindle during molt.

 

[Eric Vey]

They are about 18 months old. My complaint is that all three of the old ones and now, all three of the young ones molt so slowly. All 6 of them are buff orpingtons.

 

[aart]

Is this a breed thing or am I being overly unlucky?

It's a perception and expectation thing....and partly a breed thing.
I'm guessing you didn't know the whole story as a teen.
Eggs are a seasonal food, unless you plan your stock accordingly.
If you get new chicks every late winter, they will be laying by the following fall while the older birds molt and don't lay. I screwed that up this year, and hatched later than normal, my pullets are still not laying yet. 14 female birds and maybe 3 eggs a week.

Never had Orps but am guessing they are not prolific layers, especially as they get older. If you want lots of eggs get high production hybrids(sexlinks or leghorns),
but you still may need to add new chicks every year for year round eggs.
Supplemental lighting can help, but it's not like flipping a switch on the egg machine.

 

[Ridgerunner]

My hatchery Orps laid a medium sized egg, not large, but laid a lot of them. While I believe that breeds have general tendencies I also believe which flock they came from has more to do with how prolific they lay. Then for breed tendencies to mean much you have to have enough birds for averages to mean something. An individual can be way above or below breed tendencies. Three birds is not a lot when it comes to averages.

Some chickens are fast molters, others are slow molters. That is controlled by genetics. That has a lot more to do with how fast the feathers fall out than how fast they grow back. But there is another set of genes that have an effect on how fast they grow back. Some grow feathers faster than others. Genetics are that way, there is always something else in the mix. According to Tadkerson's "sex linked" post Orps should be slow feathering. How fast the feathers fall out will have a greater effect on how long the molt lasts than whether they are fast or slow feathering, but it all goes together. You may be unlucky in having the worst of both but I don't remember my Orps being that slow for the feathers to fall out. And they tended to start laying again when they finished the molt.

It's pretty common for certain breeds, especially hatchery production breeds, to skip the molt their first fall/winter and continue to lay until the following fall. Not all pullets do this but many do. But these will all molt that next fall/winter when the days get shorter. Their bodies just wear out with continuous egg laying and they need to refresh themselves. Like Aart, I have new pullets every year to try to get at least some eggs during molting time. Most years it works but not always.

In your mild winters in Florida I'd expect you to start seeing eggs fairly soon with those Orps, even with the days still getting shorter. Luck has something to do with it. Are you sure none of them are laying and hiding a nest from you? That's a fairly common occurrence too if you are not getting eggs when you think you should.

 

[Eric Vey]

I was thinking about the perception/expectation thing and I remembered that when I was a teenager the chickens were not living as well as these urbane chickens are.

Those chickens had a visit from Mr. Racoon sometimes. Then there was the time they had a pecking party. Replacement chicks from the feed store was a common occurrence and that's why we had a regular egg production.

These hens get locked up every night. They get talked to and (against my advice) my wife has named them. They live a very different life than the hens I had when I was teenager, not to mention a lot fewer, too.

So I'll get more patience and wait it out.

 

[Ebony Rose]

...They get talked to and (against my advice) my wife has named them. They live a very different life than the hens I had when I was teenager...

It's okay to name your birds, I'm fond of names such as A La King, A La Orange, KFC, Dumpling, Honey & Mustard (good for an inseparable pair of birds), Noodles, Omelet, Sunny (side up), etc. You get the idea :d

My Mom once had three pigs... You guessed it. Ham, Bacon and Porkchop. It makes it MUCH easier on the kids when it comes time to process them, as these animals had always been associated with food and Mom never shied away from explaining that in the future, we were going to eat those animals. In my opinion, she set a good example of explaining WHERE our food comes from, and how you can nurture and love an animal, even knowing that in its future, it's going to become dinner.