Can you believe that it's January already? Winter can be a very challenging time to keep laying hens as there are so many things to take into account. Some of these things seem quite rudimentary, but these are what we see farmers most often "miss" when they call us about production drops for their laying hens.
Lighting
The first issue we have to deal with is adjusting the light in the hen house for the shortening of daylight. The ONLY way to accomplish this is to properly follow a strict regimen of adding 5 minutes per day of artificial light. But max out the increase at 30 minutes per week. This needs to be continued until we reach 15 to 16 hours of light. After a week at this level, we need to scale them back down to about 14 ½ hours total. I have found that many farmers I’ve talked to prefer to have the lights come on gradually starting at about 4:00am and turn off gradually around 6:30pm. This gives the girls their 14 ½ hours. This will help them continue to produce eggs rather than tapering off through the winter. Hens will slow down and eventually stop laying in the winter without light stimulation.
Another aspect of lighting to consider is natural daylight. Sunlight that is too bright causes its own problems. I have gotten calls concerning the color of egg shells. While the color of the shell does not directly reflect the quality of the egg, people love those rich brown shells. If it is too bright in the house, the shell color will lighten. This can also happen with older flocks just because they are older. If there is snow on the ground, the high reflection rate can cause a normally adequate lighting level to increase to being too bright. Curtains on your windows can be your best friend. Also, make sure that there are curtains on your nest boxes. Layers like a dark area to lay their eggs. The curtains will also reduce the occurrence of peck outs.
Feed for Winter Temperatures:
Issue #2 is their feed. Chickens eat enough feed to meet their energy needs. If you are feeding your chickens a ration that was formulated to feed through warmer weather, they will over eat in the winter. They need more energy to keep themselves warm in the colder weather. When they do this, they are getting too much protein. This extra protein will cause the birds to lay more Jumbo eggs. This is typically not a preferred outcome. Contact the office to have your feed ration adjusted for the colder weather. Remember, once a hen starts laying jumbo eggs, it is VERY difficult (if not impossible) for us to get the egg sizes smaller again.
Now that we have the lighting and feed adjusted for the winter months, what else needs to be addressed. Whenever dealing with any animal health, there are 3 things that must first be evaluated. And this is the order of importance.
If you do experience any health issues, please do not hesitate to call our office for assistance. While we are not veterinarians, we have worked with many flocks and farmers and have found very helpful methods of dealing with many health issues.
Here’s looking forward to a productive winter and spring!
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