Known for its feather and wings and legs,
The chicken lays eggs and eggs and eggs!
Known for the comb atop its crown,
The chicken lays eggs of white and brown.
Known for its strut when taking a walk,
The chicken lays eggs! Ba-a-awk! Ba-a-awk!
Meish Goldish
Great little poem, don't you think? There's only one problem when applying that poem to our house. My chickens don't lay eggs.
Remember our chickens? Those cute little things we brought home back in May? You can find the original post here.
Yeah...they look like this now:
They eat all day. They poop all day - usually on my patio. They chit-chat all day with each other. They follow each other. They put themselves to bed at night. They come running when we go out side, following us closely. And they sure are fun. But where, oh where are our eggs?
By my count our chicks are 22 weeks old. Surely they should be laying by now, right? Chicken whisperers chime in. What can we do? They're on adult chicken crumble feed. They have plenty of fresh water. They get all the left over kitchen scraps they can eat. They love to dig in our compost pile, pulling out worms, grubs, etc. They scratch, they molt, they cackle. They just don't lay.
At least they're entertaining.
22 weeks should be very close to laying,if not actually laying yet (I think they say roughly 25 weeks). But check around the yard - if they are free-ranging they could be laying somewhere unexpected on you. And, check that you don't have something in the yard that will eat eggs (in my area pythons are a possibility, you will know what is in your own area).
ReplyDeleteThe white one doesn't look like it has a comb - is that a breed characteristic or is it just not visible in the photo?
Toria, it must be a breed characteristic. Everything I've read says they have a very small pea comb. I've checked the yard daily - so far no sign of anything eating the eggs - no shells left over, no snakes that I know of. I think I'll add some golf balls to their nesting box to see if that spurs anything on.
ReplyDeletethey are very cute, heres to eggs soon x
ReplyDeleteSoon! Soon! My Barred Rock and Ameracaunas were born May 25. My French Cuckoo Marans are approximately 2 weeks older. Only my Rock has begun to lay. Little eggs. Cute little eggs (to begin with) are on the way!
ReplyDeleteMiss you!
Bethann
Cute chickens. Maybe they're not females. Roosters? Sterile chickens? Great post!
ReplyDeleteyour chickens are adorable!!! Hope that they start laying eggs soon.
ReplyDeleteI remember when you first got them and posted about it. so cute!
ha ha ha, they are not sterile chickens or roosters. lol. That cracked me up. They will lay! I promise! It's kind of like mother's who get antsy when 40 weeks roll around and they start talking about inducing.
ReplyDeleteBrahma's typically don't have combs or very little of them. They are the perfect winter bird with their feathered feet, heavy bodies and no combs to freeze off. Your little brahma will also be your best layer this winter. If I could only have one chicken for survival purposes, this would be the breed. They are also a very heavy bird and make great meat birds if needed.
Wouldn't be surprised if they lay their first egg today.