Omlet cube and run

[snaps]

I wondered if anyone on the forum can suggest why our 18 month old Magpie has not produced any eggs in the last 2-3 weeks?

 

She has laid regularly since we first got her as a point of lay pullet in January '12 all through the winter up to now.

 

She is eating well, no significant change in her behaviour except perhaps not quite so keen on her food, has been wormed, checked for mites and ticks and has a bright red comb and is generally bright eyed and healthy looking. We clipped her wing last year and noticed when we clipped both hens recently that her flight feathers hadn't grown back unlike our Cuckoo Marran.

 

She is also inclined to be broody - three times last summer although each time we managed to get her out of it.

 

I wondered whether perhaps she might have been older than point of lay when we bought her? Certainly she laid straight away (next day) and we had no egg irregularities from her like double yolkers or small/large/soft shelled eggs. I thought nothing of it at the time although other hybrids we've had did produce odd eggs occasionally while just starting laying.

 

If she is older then I suppose she has just run out of eggs and come to the end of laying? Although spring and the warmer weather seems a strange time to do it.

 

Our Cuckoo Marran is laying well.

[sjp]

she could be about to moult at 18 months it about the right time assuming she was about 16 weeks old when you got her she would have been hatched around October time I've started with 2 hybrids one moulted at about 18 months the other was a bit older

[snaps]

Oh thanks for that, sjp. That makes sense.

 

This afternoon, after I'd posted, I was cleaning the poo tray from the eglu and noticed a few feathers. Also, I was watching her quite a lot and thought she looked a bit dishevelled and was a bit worried that she might be going down with something. It didn't occur to me that she was moulting 'normally'. I didn't know about hybrids moulting by age - I didn't think they moulted very much at all because they're such laying machines.

 

So thanks again. This forum always comes up with the goods!