Why Aren’t My Chickens Laying in the Winter

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Over the summer you were getting an abundance of eggs each day. So many that maybe you didn’t even know what to do with them! Then fall rolled around, and things started to slow down. By December…. you were lucky to find one lone egg in the nesting boxes. What gives?!

Just like everything, eggs have a season. There are periods of high production, and periods of slow to no production. It’s all part of a healthy cycle for your hens, and there are actually a few reasons for it. Below, you will find the top reasons, and things you can do about it.

Top Reasons Egg Production Slows

Decreased Daylight

Chickens need roughly 14 hours of daylight to lay an egg. In the summer time, when the days are long, production is high. But come winter, a chicken can go days without laying a single egg.

Freezing Cold Temperatures

If you live in an area that gets cold – hi from Minnesota – your chickens may slow their laying habits to conserve energy. It takes a lot of calories to produce an egg, and those calories are needed to keep warm.

Molt Season

I notice the biggest drop in production from molt. Each year, a mature chicken will shed some feathers to replace with shiny new ones. Sometimes it’s just a light molt and you might not notice it. Other times you might find a chicken who looks like she’s nearly been plucked clean. We call that a hard molt. Regrowth makes them look like porcupines – and they’re usually a bit shy about it. During a molt, all their extra energy goes toward regrowing those feathers – meaning egg production takes a back seat. Molt usually occurs in the fall, but I’ve known chickens to molt in the spring. It can last 8-12 weeks. With a large flock, we typically have birds molting from September through December, and our egg production slows wayyyy down.

So, what can I do about it?

Add a few new chicks each spring

This might seem like a surprising answer, but adding spring chicks each year will help you to continue to get eggs through the slow periods. Chickens don’t go through a molt until they are around 18 months old. So a spring chick won’t molt until the following fall. That means she will have just started laying eggs before the older hens start molting. They’ll hold steady with their production through the dry spell to carry you through. Not every farm is able to get new chicks each year, but we love to have fresh layers to add to our flock every spring. You can either purchase day old chicks, incubate, or my favorite way – let a broody momma hatch out a few.

Increase PROTEIN consumption

If your chickens are either battling cold temps or molting, they aren’t laying because they are using so much energy to either stay warm or regrow feathers. If you up their protein and nutrient intake, they will have more left over for eggs. Or in the case of molting, more protein can help them get through a molt quicker. I love Grubblies – black fly larvae – for a sustainable boost of proteins and calcium.

Artificial Light

By adding light to your coop, you can trick the hen’s bodies into thinking they’re getting more daylight. Keep in mind though that the natural flow of their production includes a period of rest for a reason.

While I do recommend giving high protein boosts to your ladies through the winter whether you’re worried about egg production or not, I’ve learned to accept the seasons of a hen’s cycle. It always seems like as soon as I REALLY start missing my eggs, they start picking back up again. Here we are in January, molt is over, the days are starting to get longer…. and I’m up to eyeballs in eggs again.