Will she ever lay again?

[Loco Ken]

Hey, Peeps!

Been awhile since my last post but I've been busy with life and building another chicken coop. Bigger is better, right?!

Anyway, in the group of chickens that I bought at first I had one EE "Alice" that I ended up giving to a friend because we decided to downsize the group we had because of coop size. All in all, we gave away three of the initial seven that we started with. She wasn't welcomed in her new surroundings because she was outnumbered and not part of that group. She got picked on quite a bit and the day or so after she went to this new home she quit laying. They had her for awhile and tried to get her to be a part of the group but she never quite felt comfortable with the rest. I told them that instead of wasting food and not getting anything in return (they raise for eggs) that I would take her back and try to get her to lay again by putting her back into her original group. Well, that hasn't worked either because chickens have a short term memory and forgot she was even a part of them at one time. They beat on her, too. She is pretty stable right now in the group but still gets picked on once in awhile. Throughout this whole ordeal, she has been dormant in egg laying. Will she ever go back to laying, or am I feeding a pet now? I did buy some new chicks again, hence the reason for the bigger coop and will be butchering all the older chickens except her when the others get old enough to start laying. I figure she might be comfortable then when she is with a group that won't pick on her if I slowly introduce her into the new group. Anyway, give me your thoughts on how I can/cannot remedy this situation. I would prefer to get eggs from her but I could possibly be talked into keeping her regardless. She is a pretty bird and I can't get myself to butcher her just because she's not producing, ya know?

Thanks, everyone!

Btw, the new girls are of the following varieties (one of each): Silver-laced wyandotte, golden-laced wyandotte, danish brown leghorn, black sexlink, delaware, and buff orpington.

 

[kidcody]

Any type of stress will stop egg laying all together. Unless the stress from the others goes away she probably will not lay eggs.

 

[WoodlandWoman]

Poor girl, she's had a tough time of it. I'm glad she's starting to fit in more. Chickens can stop laying eggs temporarily for a lot of different reasons, but that doesn't mean they stop laying forever. Once her stress levels go down, she should start laying again. One thing that may complicate when she'll start laying again is the time of year.

Pullets will most often lay through their first fall and winter. As hens, they start to develop a seasonal rhythm to their laying. They may go broody, usually molt in the fall and can be effected by the shorter day length in winter. It's possible that she may not start laying again until spring, when the days start getting longer. You may just have to see how it goes.

 

[Loco Ken]

I have some great news! After about nine months of not laying a darn thing, my beloved "Alice" has started to lay again. She doesn't lay every day but she has averaged about 4 eggs/week. The third one she layed was the biggest egg I have ever seen out of all of our chickens and yes, it was a huge double yoker. I was going to take a picture of it but my wife decided to use it before I could get to it. Alice is very welcomed in the group now and I don't see anyone picking on her or anyone else for that matter. We ended up butchering all but two of the younger ones as my wife was too attached to our BR and RIR's and also the BO "Honey" and the Danish Brown Leghorn "Peanut". All very beautiful birds and I'm back up to an egg a day from the rest of the group. Couldn't be happier!