Hens have started laying, at last

We didn't replace our two year old birds this year and paid the price. The cold snap in October stopped all the older birds from laying . Added to this , the young birds were brought in as day olds too late to start laying before the winter started. Generally if pullets don't start laying before October they will not lay until after the shortest day.

The result is that we had virtually no eggs before Christmas , (our biggest market) but we staill had large feed bills as the birds ate to either put on weight or in the case of older birds to replace feathers.

Now that the nights are shortening the hens are coming into lay. If you look at the picture some hens have bright red comb, in lay others have lighter pink colour, will lay in a week or two.