When do chickens lay?

[mtbeak]

All my girls give me eggs by 1pm everyday with an exception of one once a week. They get their afternoon "salad and mealworm" platter around 2, after all eggs are collected.

 

[Spikes Chooks]

It is supposed to take 25 hours for the hen to produce and lay an egg. So if on day #1 she lays at 10 am , on day#2 it would be 11am and so on and so on ........once she gets to 5pm with daylight failing she will skip a day and the whole process will start again the next morning.
I should add , that there are of course forces of nature that will upset the laying pattern. Molting, brooding, winter etc.

This is exactly what mine do. I can tell because I have four chooks of different breeds whose eggs are different enough to tell them apart. (RIR, Australorp, Barnevelder & Silver Campine). It's not that I'd get rid of anyone when they eventually stop laying - I just thought it would add to the fun of it and it sure has.

They also vary in how long it takes to lay the egg. My RIR is real quick - she LOOOOOVES her food, even for a chicken, so I figure she doesn't want to waste any time! The Australorp will take at least an hour, often two. I worried about her during last summer's heat wave as she would be panting heavily in there. Now I have some really small drink bottles, which I will fill with water and freeze and put them in the nesting boxes first thing, then change at noon for the afternoon layers. So I am ready for the next summer. I read that most chickens who die from heat stress, do that when they are in the nesting box and it sure was real hot in there.

Part of the fun of having chickens is working out how different they all can be.

 

[Joan71]

My 4 girls lay one after the other. It is like a party to them. They get pretty loud sometimes. They sing their "egg song", sometimes they all join in the song when one lays. I put two nest in the coop. I got 3 eggs for a while in one nest. Then I found one that had been laid from the roost. Next day, I found 1 egg in the 2nd nest. I had 1 hen smaller than the others, so it took her longer to mature and lay. Now she lays with the big gals, they are so proud of their success. They lay sometime between early morning and noon. They line up in their pecking order, yes, in their pecking order. Big red lays first, Blondie, next, Vanilla, next and Henny lays last. Enjoy your girls. My girls are Red sexlinks. Very good layers, friendly, we take them out each evening to free range for an hour or longer. They keep the bugs down and we enjoy our time with them.

 

[jeslyn1976]

My girls will lay in the morning between 930-10am and then ill get another egg around evening time. I really think it depends on the chicken.

 

[ChooklynFamily]

Chickens lay eggs from the morning to dusk, getting later each day by around 1 hour, due to the 25h laying interval that the chicken makes the egg in. A chicken may seem to skip an egg because the egg was ready around dusk and the chicken will wait till morning to lay it.

 

[GFamily]

I have 15 hens and only 1 laying hen right now. The one layer lays between 11:00am - 12:00pm everyday so far.....but she has only been laying 1 week.

I must say her eggs are small/big/small/big on alternating days. It's kind of weird, but intriguing.

 

[Bens-Hens]

We have 10 pullets, three have just started to lay. Our little rooster likes to join in with his own version of an egg song. I got a quick video yesterday!

In the video we have two about to lay their very first eggs, one about to climb in the box to lay her third ever and some just standing around, hopefully getting the hint lol. Ages range from 19 to 24 weeks.


Our's seem to lay in the morning, but our Australorp seems to be a bit of a princess and takes hours, accompanied by a heap of singing and panting.

 

[woodsygal]

Mine all lay by 11 am. When they were new layers I let them in the chicken yard but didn't open the main gate for free ranging until they laid.
I keep reading about the 25 hr cycle but mine seem to be laying earlier each day. I guess they didn't get the memo.

 

[naightengale]

i feel jipped my hens dont do a egg song ( they very quitely sit an lay then go about their business....

 

[appps]

I get eggs anytime through the day.