Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["John D'hondt" <dhondt@eircom.net>]

Laying is determined through greens in the diet and light hours per day and 
to a lesser extend temperature.When the temperature here dropped to -14 C 
all our free range chickens stopped laying. Some ducks kept it up.
There are commercial egg producers who have layers on a 3 hour light 2 hour 
dark regimen and they manage to get 4 eggs per day.Of course the chickens 
only last a short time then and the eggs are not really healthy to eat.
There are also artificial hormones that increase laying. They sell "Layers 
Mash" here that would almost make a cock lay eggs.
Our old breed birds average 2 eggs every three days with a stop when they 
molt of a month or more. Some of them live happily to more than 10 years 
old.
john

> In my first year with chickens, I've observed a serious variation in 
> seasonal egg production.  Peak production was one egg per chicken per day. 
> Minimum was none for a few days.  Assuming that this is normal, I'd like 
> some input on how to smooth egg availability.  How, other than 
> refrigeration, does one preserve/store excess eggs?  Are there ways to 
> manage a flock that enhances or delays egg production?
>
> E. E. "Mitch" Mitchamore
> www.hillcountrynatives.net
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Livingontheland mailing list
> Livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
> http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/livingontheland