Posted: 5/28/2015 6:03:23 AM EDT
| i have had chickens before and never had a problem with egg production. long story short chickens were killed off, and i have decided to try again. purchased two hens from a guy off craigslist, he said they were about a year old. they look full size but after a week in a chicken run with food/water and 100sgft on grass area to graze on, no eggs. any ideas? thanks in advance. |
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I'd give 'em time. Any disturbance to their chickeny little lives can cause egg production to drop off or stop, and a total change to a new location/flock certainly qualifies.
Could be molting too, but that'd be awfully coincidental to the move. My guess is they'll come around over the next couple of weeks. |
| IMHO. Stress. Give' em a few more days. Are there any dogs or cats (predators) that may be roaming around the coop? My egg production dropped off once when I had a tom cat that would circle the coop during the day. Got rid of the cat and eggs started getting produced. Chickens won't lay regularly if they don't feel safe. YMMV. |
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IMHO. Stress. Give' em a few more days. Are there any dogs or cats (predators) that may be roaming around the coop? My egg production dropped off once when I had a tom cat that would circle the coop during the day. Got rid of the cat and eggs started getting produced. Chickens won't lay regularly if they don't feel safe. YMMV. This. I had a racoon attack my birds one evening before I got home and he killed 3 hens before I took him out. Unfortunately they were so spooked that they didn't lay again for almost 2 months. |
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Rooster has teh gays? Funny. But really too many roosters too few hens can stress out the girls and slow down laying. We hatched two roosters once. When they got big enough to start chasing the hens our egg production slowed down. Got rid of the roosters and egg production started back up. |
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Quoted: i have had chickens before and never had a problem with egg production. long story short chickens were killed off, and i have decided to try again. purchased two hens from a guy off craigslist, he said they were about a year old. they look full size but after a week in a chicken run with food/water and 100sgft on grass area to graze on, no eggs. any ideas? thanks in advance. |
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i have had chickens before and never had a problem with egg production. long story short chickens were killed off, and i have decided to try again. purchased two hens from a guy off craigslist, he said they were about a year old. they look full size but after a week in a chicken run with food/water and 100sgft on grass area to graze on, no eggs. any ideas? thanks in advance. My bet is they aren't full grown yet? It took mine a while to start laying after they "looked full grown". They grow pretty fast. |
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One possibility that has not been mentioned is that they ARE laying eggs, but something is getting the eggs before you do.
However, I think the stress issues mentioned above are likely at fault. Give them some time to settle in. If they're old enough to lay, YOUNG enough to lay, have adequate quality food and enough hours of light per day, they will lay. |
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One possibility that has not been mentioned is that they ARE laying eggs, but something is getting the eggs before you do. However, I think the stress issues mentioned above are likely at fault. Give them some time to settle in. If they're old enough to lay, YOUNG enough to lay, have adequate quality food and enough hours of light per day, they will lay. The change in environment is the issue. I wouldn't worry. Separate subject, but I'll also put in a plug for watching for them laying in places besides the nests. One summer, I stacked some round bales close to the coop and we wondered why egg production went down. When I speared the top bales to feed out in the winter, dozens of eggs fell off the top. Just last week, I parked a stock trailer at a gate close to the coop. When we hauled the calves out, found a dozen eggs on the ground under there. |
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The change in environment is the issue. I wouldn't worry. Separate subject, but I'll also put in a plug for watching for them laying in places besides the nests. One summer, I stacked some round bales close to the coop and we wondered why egg production went down. When I speared the top bales to feed out in the winter, dozens of eggs fell off the top. Just last week, I parked a stock trailer at a gate close to the coop. When we hauled the calves out, found a dozen eggs on the ground under there. Quoted:
Quoted:
One possibility that has not been mentioned is that they ARE laying eggs, but something is getting the eggs before you do. However, I think the stress issues mentioned above are likely at fault. Give them some time to settle in. If they're old enough to lay, YOUNG enough to lay, have adequate quality food and enough hours of light per day, they will lay. The change in environment is the issue. I wouldn't worry. Separate subject, but I'll also put in a plug for watching for them laying in places besides the nests. One summer, I stacked some round bales close to the coop and we wondered why egg production went down. When I speared the top bales to feed out in the winter, dozens of eggs fell off the top. Just last week, I parked a stock trailer at a gate close to the coop. When we hauled the calves out, found a dozen eggs on the ground under there. Them hens be broody! 
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Separate subject, but I'll also put in a plug for watching for them laying in places besides the nests. This too. We went a while with very few eggs, and looked all over the yard without luck. A few weeks later, there was a nasty smell coming from the nearly 2 dozen eggs in the seat of my dune buggy.
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A lot of time people selling/giving away "laying" hens are actually selling mature hens that have aged beyond their laying years. This is mostly the case where someone got some chickens, had them for 3+ years, and then couldn't bring themselves to disposing of the chickens once they ceased to lay eggs. Since no one is going to want chickens that don't lay eggs, the sellers often lie about their age. Quoted:
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i have had chickens before and never had a problem with egg production. long story short chickens were killed off, and i have decided to try again. purchased two hens from a guy off craigslist, he said they were about a year old. they look full size but after a week in a chicken run with food/water and 100sgft on grass area to graze on, no eggs. any ideas? thanks in advance. What he said^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ |
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pretty much all mentioned here
your chickens are pretty much "grown" at 8 months but dont start laying for a year unlikely but possible they are old layers somebody dumped on you with new layers that dont have guidance from seasoned hens give them laying spots and get some golf balls and ceramic eggs (mark the ceramic eggs, they are really really good fakes) whenever hens get to laying age they act weird some frantically search for laying spots and are noisy and act really stupid and some pop out a egg just walking along with a shocked face  <~just like that
if you find one searching, put them in the nest box repeatedly if you find one already laying put them in the nest box with the egg once they get the hang of it they are trouble free |