What can you do when a hen isnt laying?

[Lucylou]

I've changed the title to this post as I realised it sounded so silly - it was "how do you tell a hen isn't laying" :lol: :lol: :lol: dumb or what?

So this was the post:-

Surely by the law of averages when you only have 5 chooks, once in a while they should all lay on the same day.

When poor Doris went to the great hen house in the sky the vet advised to bin her eggs as a precaution & on checking I realised that she hadn't been laying for over a week. But without her I still wasn't getting the right ratio of eggs (as I have differnt breeds they lay diff colours) So this made me wonder which chooks were laying & I started to keep a record. Over 3 weeks I've had between none & 4 eggs a day usually 3 or 4. (The most I've had was 5 once, back in January when I had 6 chooks)

So, is there a simple way of checking who is laying (apart from isolating one at a time) should I worry about the one not laying? I think its the cuckoo maran, same age, same everything as the others, & is there anything I should do to get her laying again. All LF, more or less same age, mixed breeds.

Any advice welcome Thank you.

 

[Davidd]

Hello, if you have different breeds can you not tell by egg colour which are laying? You can pick them up , look at their vent- in a laying hen it will be big and moist- in a non laying hen smaller - also usually their comb is very bright red ( obviously dependant on breed- silkies and gypsy-faced birds are blue/dark) With 5 it should not be hard to work out- if they are just young pullets then some mature quicker than others and they all wont start laying at the same time. Also some breeds don't lay as well as others- some might only lay 2-3 eggs a week while others will lay 6
regards, David

 

[snifter]

How much do you mind the possibility of a hen not laying an egg really? I think that's the key thing.

If you are getting a decent amount of eggs and have no plans to dispatch a hen who is no longer in lay possibly then I'd not worry about it. She can stay with the others. You may find she goes into lay sometime.

You could do a couple of things. One, let them out a bit later to give them a chance to lay in the morning and/or check who is sat in a box trying to squeeze one out.

When you know a hen has definately laid an egg, take a good look at it as often they all have differences in their eggs that are easy to recognise.

A Maran should lay a darker slightly speckled egg so it should be really easy to see if she is not laying any. Her eggs will look very different from other eggs being laid. If anything I'd say this was the easiest thing. I've kept Marans alongside other breeds and always could tell when they had laid.

 

[Tim]

I get the odd hen that will stop laying for no apparent reason. She usually starts again though at some point and provides eggs when the others are slowing down...

 

[Lucylou]

Thanks everyone. Its a bit of a puzzle really, Now I can see the pattern, I'm not sure if she's (whichever one it is) has ever laid. They're 10 & 11 months old now.

Snifter, I can see what you mean, apart from colour, the eggs are quite individual in shape & size. Poor Doris & the other hybrid 'mix', both laid the 'pink' eggs but different size & shape. The 2 brown eggs I get are different too.

I don't mind as long as she's happy & healthy. I'll just wait & one day it'll be a surprise to get one more egg than expected