How Do You Increase Egg Production In Chickens?

Raising backyard hens should be fun. You provide the hens with a coop, care and quality feed. They provide you with nutritious eggs and undeniable companionship. But what is the best strategy for helping your hens lay eggs that are fresh and healthy for your family?

 

A quality hen care program begins with a well-designed management strategy and a complete nutrition plan.

 

Here are three tips for laying successfully.

Starting at 18 weeks of age, provide at least 90% of the diet through a complete, high-quality egg feed.

 

When hens are laying eggs almost every day, it's a full time job. Our job is to provide them with the nutrition they need to be most successful. The first tool we can give them is a complete and balanced diet when they start laying at around 18 weeks. Hens lay more nutritious eggs when they are fed a high quality chicken feed, so feeding them can result in better nutrition for them and your family.

                   

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A whole hen diet is formulated to contain all the nutrients a hen needs to lay her eggs. The diet should include: calcium for a strong shell; amino acids, vitamins and minerals to improve egg quality and hen health; and probiotics and prebiotics to enhance the hens' digestive function.

 

A complete egg feed should make up at least 90% of a hen's diet. The remaining 10% can come from supplementary feeds such as roughage, good table scraps and oyster shells.

 

It is OK to feed chicken scraps and roughage, but we do not want to feed too much "extra" feed as it will dilute and unbalance the full range of nutrients in the hen's pellets or scraps and affect her production and health.

 

Collect eggs 2-3 times a day to prevent shell cracking.

Once the hen starts laying, be sure to collect eggs at least in the morning and in the evening. This helps keep the eggs clean and reduces the chance of them cracking due to hen traffic in the nest.

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Cracks in the egg allow bacteria to enter the egg's interior. Microscopic cracks and large cracks can be the result of an inadequate diet and infrequent egg collection. We have found that feeding a complete egg feed improves shell strength, helps with microscopic shell cracks and prevents bacteria from entering the eggs.

 

In addition, eggs should be collected 2-3 times a day. This helps prevent the eggs from being stepped on and thus breaking or cracking, which can lead to egg eating. Egg eating usually occurs when a hen finds a broken egg, tastes it, likes it and starts looking for other broken eggs and then learns to break them herself. Solve the egg-eating problem by feeding the hens to obtain strong shells and collecting eggs regularly.

Provide at least 17 hours of light per day.

Light is a key component of egg production. One of the main reasons hens may stop laying eggs is because of shortened day length.

 

Hens need at least 17 hours of daylight to maintain strong production. Without supplemental light, when daylight drops below 12 hours per day, hens will naturally stop laying eggs because of the hormonal response that light triggers in them.

 

To address this problematic hormonal response and promote long-term egg production, provide one 40-watt incandescent or 9- to 13-watt LED bulb for every 100 square feet of coop space (brighter lights are neither necessary nor advantageous). Use an automatic timer to keep light and dark times consistent so hens maintain their egg-laying and sleeping schedules.

 

As with nutrition and management, consistency is key when providing light to hens. Any variation in these factors for as little as a day or two can hinder egg production.