Nests Outside the Coop

I don't know why I didn't think of this before. I had an extra nesting box sitting outside the coop on my little utility cart, but I hadn't put in any nesting material. I also noticed that the girls used only three of the four nesting boxes inside the hen house.

Given that the girls did find a way to lay eggs under the utility cart, I wondered if they would use nesting boxes on the cart. To test my theory, I took out the extra box and set it next to the box on the cart. I then added some nesting straw and one wooden egg to each.

Results are shown!
Ed Rovera

It's Easter all Winter Long!

The other day I went in to feed the goats and found this. Apparently Chowder thinks the goat feeder is a very plush nest! I'll find a way to avoid the year-long Easter Egg Hunt and report back.
Ed Rovera
PS: On 9 April 2024 I found an egg in the straw in the bottom condo. The goats really don't care where the girls go inside their enclosure!

News on the Chicken Front

Just a bit of news about the birds. The light seemed to have worked as expected. Egg production went up during the shorter winter months. I also started letting the girls outside the coop more, a move they definitely like. And B&C ignore them completely, which is nice.
Ed Rovera

Let There Be Light

Around mid-September I noticed the girls production drop off. The Ameraucanas basically stopped laying altogether. Just before I had surgery I rigged up an LED floodlight in the hen house and put it on a timer. Now, the inside of the house is lit up from 4AM to 8AM. This added 4 hours gives them a minimum of 14 hours of daylight each day. According to the gurus of YouTube, at least 14 hours of light is required for peak egg laying.

At first, I didn’t notice any change. We would get one or two eggs from the Rhode Island Reds and maybe one a week from the Ameraucanas. But after about two weeks, it was like someone turned on the egg faucet; we were back to 3 to 5 eggs a day. The Rhode Islands are still better producers, both in number and egg size, but the pretty birds are back to earning their mealworms again. Ed PS: Today was a 5 egg day — 3 brown from the Rhode Islands and one each from Cinder and Chowder. Goldie gave me one yesterday. She’s still in my good graces.

And if you are wondering how I know which Ameraucana lays each day, I’ve figured out the colors from each hen. Goldie lays pale blue eggs. They are almost white. Chowder’s eggs are an aquamarine blue as are the eggs from Cinder. However, Cinder’s eggs have tiny speckles on them. Chowder’s rarely have anything that might be seen as a blemish.