Monday, September 27, 2010

More Eggs.

Sunday I went out to gather eggs and there on the floor of the coop was the cutest little brown egg. In the box was a large light brown egg belonging to our hen Cinnamon. I was so excited to see the little egg. It was the first of my black sex-linked girls. The black girls looks exactly alike so we call them the twins. Later in the day I got a large brown egg know to be from our hen Ginger. Yesterdays count 3 eggs. WOO HOO!

The great thing about only having 4 female birds is that it is pretty easy to figure out who laid what with little effort. So today I go out in the early afternoon and check. TWO little eggs on the floor. WOO HOO! That means both of The Twins are laying! Later Cinnamon blessed us with her egg. Ginger skipped today but that is fine.

It takes chickens around 25-26 hours to make an egg. So that means most hens will not lay every day. For example Ginger is our best layer. She lays about 5-6 eggs a week. She will lay for about 3 days, each time later in the day by a few hours. Then skip the 4th day and start over in the morning on the 5th day. Chickens also do not lay eggs after dark. So if they haven't laid by evening then they usually wait until morning. Pretty interesting huh? Cinnamon will do the same, but sometimes skip after 2 days. Stress will also interrupt the laying cycle. Things like extreme heat, cold or wet, even moving to a new coop or home can be stress for them. For the most part they are pretty easy to care for an I am excited to be getting more eggs now.

1 comment:

Sarah said...

Wow! That is really interesting. You will have to post some egg pics. :)