How to Get Your Chickens to Lay More Eggs

How to Get Your Chickens to Lay More Eggs
By Connie Lewis

If you own chickens, you will agree with me when I say that you can have fresh, high quality eggs almost at will. I like to call them containers full of goodness. It’s needless to say that few foods contain the kind of nutrients that eggs have.

If you know how to raise chickens, they will lay eggs, irrespective of whether they are fertilized or not. Producing eggs happens naturally in a chicken’s body. However, there are external factors that can reduce their ability to produce eggs. The good thing is there are a few things you can do to increase the amount of eggs your chickens lay.

Here’s how to get your chickens to lay more eggs:

1. Have comfortable nesting boxes… Provide your chickens with nesting boxes and make them as comfortable as you can. Fill them with hay and have a depression at the center of the box to make the chickens feel comfortable when sitting on them. If your chickens feel that they’re in a safe place it goes without saying that they will produce more eggs.

2. Provide warmth… Have a few heat lamps placed around the nesting boxes. Ensure that they’re turned on low heat. Also, make certain that the boxes are warm so as to entice the hens to lay eggs. However, providing warmth may only be necessary during the cold months.

3. Have fluorescent lights in place… Making your flock lay many eggs mean getting creative. Attach fluorescent lights to timers and set them to turn off and on for twelve hours at a time. Have them on during the normal daylight hours and keep them on the power off mode during the night.

Place them so that they can distribute the light evenly in the coop. Indeed, you will have replicated day and night and this will create an environment that will allow your chickens to consistently lay eggs. This tip is especially workable during the cold winter months when it’s darker.

4. Collect eggs routinely… Make sure that you collect eggs for the coop every morning and make it a routine. Leaving the eggs to stay for long periods of time in the nesting boxes may make the chickens want to hatch them, even when they’re infertile. This is a process known as brooding, which makes the chicken stop laying eggs.

5. Be patient with the chickens… The quest on how to raise chickens also calls for some patience. Maybe the reason that your chickens are laying few eggs is because they are not at their prime age. Allow the chickens to be at least sixteen to twenty-six weeks before you can realistically expect them to start laying eggs. As a matter of fact they may start laying the eggs a little bit later, but you’d be disappointed if you expect them to start laying many eggs before they’re sixteen weeks old.

6. Feed the chickens well… If you feed your chickens on cheap, usually low quality food, it may lead to a dismal or complete non-existent egg production. Do you want your chickens to produce more eggs? Feed them right. Research has shown that corn, starchy feeds and oils can lead to a reduced egg production rate. Knowing how to raise chickens means that you give the foods which will supply them with all the needed nutrients this not only ensures they stay healthy, but increases productivity as well. Once in a while, feed your chickens some crushed oyster shells to increase calcium intake, which is very crucial in egg development.

7. Give them a lot of water… You may not know it, but chickens require a consistent supply of water to remain healthy and productive. Check water levels at least twice every day and be sure to replace the water in case it’s dirty.

Chickens, unlike other animals don’t need personalized attention. Learning how to raise chickens at home can be very fulfilling. However, knowing how to make homemade chicken feed [http://storageshedskits.ca/how-do-you-make-homemade-chicken-feed/] can save you money and product healthier chickens. For more information visit [http://storageshedskits.ca/how-do-you-make-homemade-chicken-feed/]

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