New cock, hens stopped laying ...

[cardoon]

Hello there, I wonder if anyone can help. We have a largeish group of chickens (around 35) with a dominant cock plus any that have been bred earlier in the summer (currently only one). To prevent in-breeding, we swapped our cock for that of a neighbour's a few weeks ago. Since then the hens have pretty much gone on-strike egg-wise, we get 3 to 8 eggs per day instead of 15 to 20.

The new cock is a lot less 'ballsy' than our previous boy, his crow is almost inaudible and he only rarely does the business with the hens, as far as we can tell. Is this an explanation for the drop-off in eggs? I know that with winter coming the egg production will drop, but compared to previous years the current numbers are a bit ridiculous.

I'd be really interested to hear of any similar experiences or advice anyone has, many thanks.

 

[mollteaser]

I've not had any eggs since September! I've only got 3...(again...briefly had 4)

 

[foxy]

I doubt it is anything to do with the cockerel. More likely age of your hens, and the breed. 17

 

[chrismahon]

I agree with Foxy. The drop off must be due to other factors and the change of cockerel is co-incidental. Our egg production dropped dramatically a few weeks ago and nothing has changed. Loads in moult but dark gloomy weather doesn't help and clocks changing means noisy nightime for them.

 

[Chuck]

The new male might have a slight effect as they don't like change but I'd put it down to this being the most peculiar year I can remember, moulting out of sequence, egg laying dismal. The short daylight is a major factor and a lot depends on the age & type of your hens.

 

[animartco]

In my experience hens do 'mope' after the removal of their cockerel. I actually have one very depressed hen at the moment whose cockerel (and father) was removed last weekend.
Your hens would almost certainly go off lay until they have come to terms with their loss and accepted the new cockerel as their alpha male. How long this takes might depend on the elligibility of the cockerel!

 

[cardoon]

Thanks for your replies folks. Our hens are a mixed bunch, mostly hybrids from various markets (we live in France) mixed up with our own offspring, definitely nothing fancy. It's true that a number of them are three or four years old and can't be expected to produce much, but there are a number of one and two-years olds as well, who don't have any excuse. I'm keeping an eye on them, suspect now that they might be wanting more food - the weather here has remained unbelievably mild, so I've not started them on their winter pasta for breakfast yet. That might raise the egg production level. I'll leave the cock to settle in a bit longer. Thanks again for your interesting replies.

 

[chrismahon]

Think you will find that pasta will reduce egg laying as it has no nuitritional value to speak of Cardoon. Can you get proper layers mash or proper feeds over there? I ask because we are moving over next year and I've approached Garvo to supply feed. I know Marriages supply Brits over there as one turns up at the Factory in Kent in a lorry every 4 months and takes a couple of tonnes back over. What's teh availability of local chemical free foodstuffs?

 

[cardoon]

Yes I take your point about the nutional value of pasta (not much), it's more for the warmth factor when the temperatures don't raise above zero in the daytime in winter. Re food availability, as you can imagine there are loads of people raising chickens in the rural areas, such as where we are, so there are loads of types of food available - even the supermarkets have bags of maize and wheat, for example, and chains like Gamme Vert, and local agri coops, usually supply the full range of feeds from full-on GM rubbish to smarter stuff. We get our grain from neighbours and, with a market garden of organic vegetables, they get lots of veg. left-overs. What they really want though is more protein (they get left over fish from our fishman, which they love), I've never heard of Marriages, Garvo rings a bell but as I say we try to buy from neighbours. We have tried the layers' pellets, but they don't like them.