Best hen breed for laying eggs

martyoo

Hi,

What is the best hen breed for laying eggs in terms of production? I currently have a few Rhode Island reds and I was thinking getting a few more but wasn't sure if I should stick to the same breed or not.

haybob

I find boiled potatoes mixed with stale bread is the best feed for hens plenty of room the graze and forage also helps

aonb

since you are talking about 'a few' I assume you mean for home consumption.
The best layers in terms of egg numbers short term are the hybrids - rhode island red hybrids, or leghorn hybrids etc. Ive heard good things about hyline's.
The thing about hybrids is that they are small, bred to lay, will produce a good number of eggs over a relatively short period of time; their laying life is shorter.
If you get a pure breed hen, you will have less eggs per week in comparison to the hybrids, but their laying lives are longer.
Ive found that staggering the ages of your hens, means you dont have a 'feast' then a 'famine' (i.e. dont buy all your hens at once!)

As to the perfect food for hens, its LAYERS PELLETS - everything a hen needs nutritionally is in layers pellets. Once you start introducing far tastier things like bread (too much salt) and potatoes (no protein/calcium there) they will ignore the pellets and far prefer the treats. And yes, foraging and freeranging will vastly improve your hens laying and the quality of the eggs.

martyoo

Thanks aonb,

When I say a "few" I was thinking of about 40+
So when you say "rhode island red hybrids" are they a separate breed to the standard rhode island reds?

As to the perfect food for hens, its LAYERS PELLETS - everything a hen needs nutritionally is in layers pellets.

Great thats what I am feeding them (100 grams each) and some veg peelings.

aonb

a Rhode Island Red Hybrid, is a cross between a Rhode Island Red and another breed (Hybrid=crossbreed or mongrol!) They are very often crossed in this country with Legbars (also v.good layers) or Sussex etc etc. Depends on what the breeder chooses to breed with. (Ive recently got a v.small hybrid Rhode IslandxLegbar which as I say are v.small, v. easy to handle & fantastic layers)

I guess with 40+ hens, you wont be falling into the trap of feeding them treats and making pets of them

You cant overfeed a hen so letting them have constant access to pellets is fine.
(Dont forget they will need some grit of some sort if not freeranging)

Sharpshooter82

Rhode islands are def the best. I changed my hens once to Sussex and a few other breed but never again. I'm back with the RIRs

martyoo

Thanks for the advice. Would 250 eggs in a year be achievable with a hybrid?

Ding Dong

yes, depending on the strain but in general yes in their 1st 2-3 years

martyoo

Thanks Ding Dong :pac:

haybob

I don't know why I decided to tell ye all what I feed my hens


I have a few Barred Rocks that are great hens, more personality than the red

aonb

haybob wrote: »

I don't know why I decided to tell ye all what I feed my hens


I have a few Barred Rocks that are great hens, more personality than the red

Haybob, boiled potatos are fine, and if you have plenty of free ranging and they're laying, then thats fine. I used to feed mine a lot of bread (high salt content which is so bad for hens) and house scraps until I found that they would refuse to eat the pellets (which are nutitionally balanced diet) then I had crop problems & egg problems. Ive had to restrict them from freeranging (they're in a 90ft retired-veg-garden now) so its very important that they eat the layers, so Ive pretty much stopped the bread/scraps etc

The Barred Rocks are my favourites (any of the barred breeds) - are your reds HYBRIDS or pure breed? I have pure breed reds, and they are not half as good as the red hybrids. (two of my pure breed reds are 7 yrs old and 1 is still laying a few a week)