Fresh Laid Eggs Once Again
Wishing Everyone The Best 2010! What better way to start the New Year, writing about newly laid eggs, a symbol of fertility and new life through the ages.
My French Marans hens have started laying their beautiful chocolate eggs once again, only six days after the winter solstice, December 21, which marks the commencement of longer daylight. The increased daylight often measured in increased minutes of daylight, signals chickens in general to begin laying.
If you let your hens follow their instincts, and don’t add supplemental light in their coop to keep them laying, they will take a natural break or molt in the fall to winter, and begin laying once again with the natural stimulation of incremental increased daylight. This can vary by a hen’s age and breed. When a hen does start laying once again, after a break, her eggs might be smaller at first in size.
In a previous post here at VGG, Discovering The French Marans Chicken Breed, I write in detail about the French Maran breed, and how they actually secrete a dark chocolate tint to their eggs aided by a unique mucous gland in the last moments of laying their eggs. This is the secret of their deep chocolate color, and what is unique to their breed. In the photo above, you can see the first egg is two-toned, as my French Marans hen, Coco, turned on her mucous gland, as she commences to begin laying her first egg, after her fall/winter break. The second laid egg is fully tinted dark chocolate, and it appears that her egg-laying process is in place. It is yet another example of how beautiful mother nature is.
For more information on the French Marans Chicken Breed please go to Marans Chicken Club USA. See “Diggin’ These Links”, on my home page- left side bar, for more chicken-related links I’ve assembled especially for you.
Are your hens starting to lay since the winter solstice? Do you have any “egg stories” to share?
Announcing for all of you that live in the Encinitas area, Weidner’s Gardens is hosting a “Fruit Tree Workshop” on Saturday, January 16, 2009. Come see their fabulous bare root fruit tree selection for the season, and learn a few tips. See below for details. Hope to see you there!
11:00-1pm, Master Gardener, John Marsh, will speak on “Pruning Your Fruit Trees.”
1:00-2:00pm, VintageGardenGal, Bonnie Manion, will speak on the “Basics of Espaliered Fruit Trees.”
Weidner’s Gardens, 695 Normandy Rd., Encinitas, CA 92024, (tel) (760) 436-2194, www.weidners.com, Saturday, January 16, 2009, Hours are 9:00am – 4:30pm
{ 18 comments… read them below or add one }
Oh, my heart skipped a beat when I read about the fruit tree class. I would LOVE to attend (I’m not that far away), but I will be over near Santa Barbara that weekend with our church staff for our annual retreat. I have taken a master gardener course, but would love to learn more on Espaliered Fruit Trees. It would be great if you would consider doing some posts about this topic after your class is over!
I’m thrilled to say that yesterday, three of my “girls” started laying again! Two days in a row! Hopefully it will continue. Thanks for sharing the info on the natural light. I did not know that artificial light would effect their molting.
Amy, please look under my category “trees”, I have written two posts on espaliered trees to get you started. Thanks for your great comment…VintageGardenGal
I’m so inspired by your chickens and their beautiful eggs, but can you have them in the North County? Where can I look up the laws for this area. Do yo have a special way of housing your chickens? Thank-you for your beautiful web-site. By the way Pat Welsh is one of my dearest friends!
Have a beautiful day,
Mary
Mary, check with your city zoning department. You live in a specified zoning category determined by your address or parcel number. Yes, I have a specific coop and outside pen, please see some of my posts under chickens category. I have photos and go into details on optimum housing for chickens. Good luck.
Pat Welsh is a very special friend in my life, too. Thanks for your kind words and comments…..VintageGardenGal
Wow, I love it when I learn something new! I had no idea that chickens stopped laying eggs in the fall and winter. What is the time period, approximately, when the chickens are resting? Is this particular to this breed, or chickens in general?
Thanks for your wonderful blog.
We are so excited! We have our first eggs. Our Delaware, Della, has laid her first 11 eggs! We have eaten them with friends whoo have come to visit us and they were deelicious. She started on a Tuesday and we have gotten one egg every day for 5 days and then she took one day off. Then she laid for another 5 days taking off the 6th day. She started again today. It seems that she keeps laying later and later each day until the 5th day when she will lay around 7-8 PM and then the next day she takes off. Do hens run in cycles like this? My other 6 hens; 2 Wyandottes, 2 Jersey Giants, and 2 Buff Orpingtons are not laying yet. It appears that the wattles and combs of the Buffs, Lucy and Penny, are maturing faster than the other girls. Della’s comb and wattles appear to be mature. Is this a sign of hens beginning to lay? We are loving raising our girls. Our mini dachshunds love them as well, the hens and the dogs lay together. Especially when we bring a hen inside to sit with us in front of the fireplace and the pups jump up and lay with the hens on our lap.
Susan, yes, chicken breeds vary a little bit with egg laying, life cycle, etc. Generally most hens begin to lay at 5-6 months old.
They lay an egg just about every 24 hours. Their first year laying is generally their best at over 90%. Over the course of their life, their egg production can be charted somewhat like a “bell curve”, eventually tapering off entirely. Chickens are a treat to have in your life. Thanks for your great comment…VintageGardenGal
Patti, molting usually is a 4-6 week process. Yes, it does vary by breed, when they molt, how they lay. Hens are affected by the length of daylight. In a backyard situation, you can artificially supplement them with increased light with adding a simple light bulb in their coop, but I like to let my hens molt and lay naturally by daylight length. Thanks for your great comment…VintageGardenGal
Hi Bonnie, A friend of mine was asking me about the “bloom” on Della’s eggs. Her eggs are clean and do not have any film or anything on them. Is this good or bad?
Susan, every hen’s egg receives a protective film around it, when it is freshly laid. You usually cannot detect it unless you actually watch Della lay her egg, and then touch the egg. It is slightly moist to the touch, and dries very quickly. It is mother nature’s way of protecting an egg. That is why, to best keep your eggs fresh from your backyard flock, do not wash your eggs (unless they are so dirty from manure or something) before refrigerating. If you wash your freshly laid eggs, you wash off their natural protection coat that keeps them fresh. Thanks for your great comment….VintageGardenGal
We are geting our first laying hens tomorrow. A family decided to stop farming and we are the lucky recipients. I’m doing some crash training in taking care of layers and gleaned some good info from your site. I need to be able to identify the types of hens we’ll have, determine who is laying and who is not, well, I need to learn just about everything. Wish me luck. June in Alaska
June, welcome to the world of chickens! I suggest you look on some of the websites I list for chickens on my left side bar–home page, Diggin’ These Links. You can look for some of the breeds you have. Thanks for your great comment…VintageGardenGal
Thanks so much for your wonderful posts on chickens. My husband just finished our chicken coop, so we are about to get some chickens. Do you find that the Marans is a good breed for children? I have heard that they can be aggressive. Do you recommend that we start with young hens or can we mix a couple of young with a couple of mature ones?
Ashlee, under categories on my home page, http://www.vintagegardengal.com, look for the chicken category. I actually wrote a post on Chickens and Children, and many more chicken-related topics. I got my Maran hens from a breeder when they were over a year old. Consequently, they were not treated like pets, and are uncomfortable being held, etc. Maran hens are quite large, and when I introduced them into my existing flock, they were very aggressive towards my other hens.
It is easier to imprint and bond with your chickens, the younger you get them. I recommend you start with young hens all about the same age. Sometimes when you mix young and mature hens together it is not a good recipe. Sometimes it is just fine.
Welcome to the world of chickens…..VintageGardenGal
Hi Bonnie, We now have four of our seven hens laying. They are really funny. Our Delaware lays in one of two laying boxes, but will not let any other hen lay in it. The second hen an Orpington, has figured a way to dig through the hay and shavings and she squeezes herself under one of the laying houses and lays there. We placed a bushell basket in the coop to see if anyone would like that and sure enough the Jersey Giant and one Wyandotte are sharing this laying box. Maybe the last three hens will use the second laying box. They all seem to have their own preferences and they don’t seem to follow the “rules”. We especially get a kick out of Della shooing out the other hens from “her” box. She also sleeps in there and we cannot get her to roost with the others sometimes she lets the two Orpingtons sleep in her box with her, but she will not let them lay in there. She seems to be the Queen of the coop, she is nice but firm with the other girls. We just have to clean her laying box well to keep her eggs clean. Any suggestions for us about our crazy, beautiful and fully entrancing “Sisters of the traveling Chicks?”
How is your construction going? I hope all of your ideas are beginning to take shape and form and you are really pleased.
Susan, my information on nesting boxes and roosting bars are suggestions, and what is typical. Like your hens, there are hens that don’t like to follow the norm, and that is quite alright. It sounds like Della is your alpha hen, and top of the pecking order in your flock. Chickens are full of personality, aren’t they. I’m glad you are enjoying your chickens.
We are about half way through our remodel, with quite a bit of rain lately. Things are going well. Thanks for your great comment….VintageGardenGal
Hi there. Still cold here in Alaska, but we had a warm spot wherein the chickens definitely laid more eggs than they have been. The weather turned cold again and they dropped egg production by less than half. I decided to raise the temperature in the coop by a mere 2 degrees and they upped production again!
My question for you is, I have one hen, possibl a cochin – barred female (she has stripes like a zebra) that was getting ganged up on today. I just happened to be in the coop at the time and pushed the others off her, but they just kept coming at her. I finally lifted her into a nesting box and they seemed content to let her stay there unmolested.
What might be the reason for “ganging up” on one particular chicken? And, would there be a way to stop the behavior, as I cannot be there all the time to protect her.
Also, I’ve been giving my compost scraps to the hens, along with egg shells. I’ve been given opposing advice; 1. to grind up the shells before giving them to the hens, so they don’t become cannibals and 2. it really doesn’t make any difference, they won’t eat their own eggs. Well, I’ve been following #2 and have, to date, found evidence of two eggs that have been eaten in the coop. Should I assume by this, that I should have and should, from now on, follow #1? Thank you for your reply. Sincerely, June in AK
June, all flocks have a pecking order. Somehow your hens perceive your cochin to be weak. It is difficult to say how to correct. Are your hens stressed with temperature, spacing? Sometimes that sets off aggression. Sometimes time itself just works it out, sometimes you might have to separate your hen from the others or she will be pecked to injury or death. If it was summer, I would say spray your hens with water to stop them, but not in winter.
I wouldn’t give my hens their eggshells back to them. To me, that is encouraging them to peck their eggs, and you don’t want that. I put my eggshells in my compost. If you are feeding your hens an overall chicken laying mash, they should have oyster shell listed as one of the ingredients. Stay warm….VintageGardenGal