Marans

I was shocked to discover that in the UK in November there were only 36 hours of sunlight - the lowest ever. It feels as though the cloud hasn't lifted here for about 10 days; its ultra depressing :-)06
 
Weather has been awful here (Midlands UK). One day last week it looked like the sun had set in the middle of the day. I had read somewhere that less than 12 hours was the egg laying cut off Chris but your saying still going at 9. Sounds right now as although I'm using lights so I can tend the coop past daylight I've tried to keep under 12 hours but am having regular eggs every day still except for a brief lull during a very short molt in September.
 
12 hours might be the cut off for eggs every day Rick? I've heard that number quoted before but my experience doesn't support it. As daylight hours reduce the laying period extends from 24 hours or so to 36 hours or so. We have a TNN laying every other day at the moment. Some have finished moulting and started laying again slowly, others haven't started again- the real oldies. We've got two just started to moult so they are going to be cold if the weather turns! I also think the temperature has a lot to do with laying -if it is cold their food intake is used to stay warm rather than produce eggs. It's unusually very mild here at the moment with daytime 18C and night 7C. Previous years it has been well below zero at night from November onwards and we didn't get so many eggs as we are getting this year.
 
I'm getting an average of three eggs a day off the seven ex-batts who are laying, I've never seen hybrids stop laying during winter (only some pure breeds) and the first year birds barely even slow down in my experience.
 
Back in the UK at the mo, heading back in the spring :D

I've never had a winter egg :-)06
 
Its because I keep big fat orpingtons as my main breed :( The fabulous polands do lay late Jan if I am lucky, but more often its Feb, which in my optimistic world counts as spring (ie the snowdrops!) The sussex are also late layers. We just do without as far as possible through Nov-Jan. I do buy eggs around Christmas, as a treat, but I try to make my cake far enough in advance with my own eggs :D
 
Our French Buff Orpingtons were laying a week ago but are now moulting! They lay very well (large eggs daily) because French breeders have not lost sight of the fundamentals, that chickens are primarily for eggs and not just decorative ornaments. So breeding selection is based both on laying performance and appearance. Because of serious inbred faults (bad hips, ingrowing feathers, digestive disorders) we will eventually be replacing our Buff Orpingtons with Brahmas I think, but it will depend on laying performance here, because reading a book last month on English strains said that they were exceptionally poor layers of small eggs?

We freeze our surplus eggs MrsBiscuit and use them for baking. The long term intention is to hatch all our Spring eggs to get layers through Winter, but at the moment we haven't space for the rearing.
 
Guess I spoke too soon! just a few days off the shortest day and both Marans have stopped laying. So I think for them 9 hours is their absolute minimum, even with warm weather. Fortunately our 5 Leghorn pullets are laying well, one 18 month old Buff Orpington and now two 4 year old TNN's (the other one is moulting).
 
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