Why Aren't My Chickens Laying? Here Are Your Answers!

[kdmburnett]

good idea......thanks! no treats( ok, just a handful for 19 hens) and only fresh veggies.no bread, scratch, barley, etc. until they are back on schedule......19 hens-3 eggs.....i don't think so.........

 

[traybo]

I have over 60 hens and yes ive added some newbies recently, but i have had issues with them laying for months.. they will lay 1 to 2 dozen for a week or so and then drop to 5 or 6 a day.. in the process i have found mites on them and treated them with 7dust and DE earth then noticed some had bubbles in there eyes and some had puffy eyes and one had a swollen jaw but she is in isolation.. i have rencently made there hen house bigger and treated them for worms and treated them with sulmet which had no effect on them now i am currently treating them with duramycin 10 and ivormec drops for all parasites inside and out... i should be getting like 4 or 5 dozen from these hens.. any suggestions on what i can do? or do i just have a bunch of diseased chickens.. or are they all old? how can I tell if there all old? please help me with any suggestions !!

 

[Cass]

Quote:

I'm sorry to hear about your troubles.

My only suggestion is to walk around the coop with a stock pot calling "here chickie, chickie"

On another thread they decided that the only way to tell the age of a chicken is to cut it in half and count the rings.

(I don't think they were serious tho)

and hopefully someone with more knowledge will chime in soon.

*bump*

 

[speckledhen]

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You may not want to know what I have to say about disease. Respiratory illness will certainly cut down your egg production. I do not treat for it, refuse to treat for it. No breeder treats it; a breeder culls sick birds. When you begin having too many issues at once, that may be something to consider. That is really for another thread, though.

 

[Cass]

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You may not want to know what I have to say about disease. Respiratory illness will certainly cut down your egg production. I do not treat for it, refuse to treat for it. No breeder treats it; a breeder culls sick birds. When you begin having too many issues at once, that may be something to consider. That is really for another thread, though.

I was going to say that. I know it is what I would do if I were faced with that MANY problems in my flock. Right now is a good time to "start over" cuz so many people are giving away free chickens as they think about winter coming again this year. Cull the ones that are sick and add free chickens from BYC members in your area and/or CL.

 

[traybo]

 

[rancher hicks]

I don't know what's going on but I got 6 eggs from over 26 hens and most of them are newbies to laying. Everyone seems healthy enough.

 

[kdmburnett]

ok then..what are the symptoms of infectious respiratory disease? my eggs seem to have some of the "symptoms"

 

[flocksalot]

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I don't cull just because a chicken is ill. I don't sell my chickens and I don't show them. It's important that if you were breeding or showing that your flock be disease free. We have a hugh problem with wild birds bringing in disease so I know that when I start finding dead wild birds I'm going to have some sick chickens. There is no way I can keep my flock from being exposed as they have the better part of 13 acres to dig, scratch, and eat. This spring was so wet and cold that is just seems to bring on illness. We had a new chicken that I got off CL (the worst place in my experience to get chickens of any age) turned up with bubbles in her eyes. She was droopy and depressed. I put her on Sulmet and she recovered in a day. Then we had birds darn near dropping out of the sky. Wasn't just one type of bird either. Smokey our Lakenvelder roo and 4 of his 8 girls came down with similar symptoms then it went through Rudy our other roos house. We lost Pricilla. Amanda never seemed to recover and susequently died last month. Everyone else recovered fine, but their egg production took some time to come back for the older girls. The young ones (less than 2 years) recovered fine and began laying almost immediately. Of course I couldn't use their eggs, but the pig loved them. I treated initially with Sulmet, but switched to sulfadimethoxine after seeing no immediate response. My flocks are vaccinated for anything and everything. I have some vaccinations done at the hatchery others are started at about 5 weeks old. This should keep them from becoming too ill, but things do happen. During their illness they were seperated from the rest of the flock. Much to my husbands disbelief that I could and would take over his shed with sick animals. We also got a crippled piggy that I put in there. Man was he mad. But hey everyone is healthy and out of their now. Heck I even cleaned it. If you can I would take one in to have a diagnosis done. If not you can do what others have done and treat as per symptoms on the medicatin lables. I can tell you you won't get much for eggs until your girls are healthy. The other thig I would look at is feed. I used to purchase my feed from a farm type store, but switched to a grain elevator. The quality appears to be much better and my lazy layers aren't so lazy anymore. Another problem I had was my neighbor giving my girls way to much corn. They completely stopped laying. I had to tell him to give the corn to the pig if he ever wanted to get anymore eggs. It's like candy to them. They will run over to the feild and pick until they have a HUGE crop. I always know who's been the bad girl at night when I'm counting them. Another thing that happened to me was I was getting some "young" hens supposedly all less than a year old, but sent my husband to pick them up. My husband was given some old ladies. Yes they will still lay some eggs, but not quit what I expected. A young hens breasts will be tender, and old hens will feel solid. My husband thought they were just nice big girls. He will never again be allowed to go by himself. I think they see him coming from a mile away.

So if you've already went through everything and made sure they always have plenty of fresh water then try a different feed and skip the treats. Let them get better and settle into a routine. Once they are happy and healthy you could be regretting asking them for more eggs.

I hope I was able to help and good luck.

 

[speckledhen]

Can we please take the disease talk to another thread in Emergencies and Diseases? This thread is not for that subject.

I do not, do NOT want to get into some argument about cull or not cull. My policy is to cull for all respiratory illness other than situational pneumonia and I will not get into a debate here.