Our girls have stopped laying.
They’re now nearly three and a half years old, and we get just the occasional egg from them these days. And to be fair, they did lay daily for two and a half years – that’s over 900 eggs each. I haven’t produced nearly that many during my lifetime.
But…the eggs are important. The chooks aren’t pets, after all, they’re livestock. If they’re no longer producing, then it’s time to stop feeding them and get some new ones in. If we’re going to operate with some pretense of partial self-sufficiency, then there’s no room for sentimentality.
Wouldn’t you agree, Rosemary?
Sigh.
I guess we always knew that it was never going to happen. Our remaining four girls – Rosemary, Harriet, Bertie and Francesca – are all ridiculously robust, especially for old chooks who are now barely laying.
Pete and I discussed the issue at length and in the end, we decided that the girls have earned their retirement. They’ve worked long and hard for us – laying eggs, rotovating the soil, picking out all the tiny bulbs of oxalis and eating the snails. We’ve come to know each of them by both appearance and personality, and would miss them terribly if they were gone.
So the current plan is this – when we lose the next hen and we’re down to just three, we’ll get some more. There’s plenty of room in the dome, and lovely Linda has given us tips on how to introduce new chooks to the flock. It will be a rough couple of weeks, but hopefully it won’t take too long for the new girls to settle in.
In the meantime, we’ll make do with the few eggs that we’re collecting. I guess if things get really dire, I’ll have to buy eggs for the first time in three years, and that’s not something I’m looking forward to. But the alternative, which is to get rid of our old girls, just isn’t an option for us.
Do you have backyard chooks? If so, I’d love to know what you did when your girls stopped laying. Whatever you decided, you won’t get any judgment from us – we know how difficult the decision can be!
Fig Jam and Lime Cordial 
I was going to get all teary for a second but was so glad to read you were keeping these lovely ladies. I have a balcony so am no use to you with advice but how awesome that they’ve produced so many eggs you haven’t had to buy them for years!
Gabriella, they’ve kept us, my parents and the neighbours in eggs for three years! They really have earned their keep.. :)
We had some chickens firstly for the eggs, and like you we became attached to them. When they stopped laying we didn’t choose to eat them, three in particularly, croad langshan bantams come to mind, perhaps now is a good time to mention that 2 of our ‘old ladies’ lived to be 13 years old. We had no idea little bantams could live so long.
I have friends who despatch and eat theirs every three years having given them a lovely free range life.
There was a Poultry auction market close to where we lived so we used to take the larger birds to be auctioned for the table, we couldn’t bear to eat our ‘friends’, call us soft I suppose.
Cynthia in UK
Cynthia, that’s one of the reasons we’re going to keep going with ISA browns, they’re not a particularly long-living breed. I’m not sure I could be as generous with food and space to a chook that lived for a decade after it had stopped laying! We’re soft too – it’s not a bad way to be, is it? :)
We have several dozen chooks, always with some not yet of laying age or just at that point. This allows for a steady supply of eggs for our use and some to sell.
Non-productive hens eventually end up in Freezer Camp for future stews and chooks & dumplings.
The key is to not name future meals.
RR, how nice to see you! Thanks for stopping by! You and Gail are far more pragmatic than we are, and you’re right, the secret really would have been not to name them, but we only have a few.. ;-)
Ha, I love it. As you already know, if you decide to ‘retire’ the girls, then they are, and have been, pets! I grew up on a chicken farm, and my father was smart – my sister wanted to treat some of the chickens as pets (not me, in those days I hated everything about chickens) so he told her to pick out one chicken as a pet, and that one was kept in a separate pen near the hIouse – she also had a duck there too – ducks have lots more personality than do chickens, in my opinion – I liked the duck.
I bet you never decide to have the old girls for dinner either, will you!
Doc, we’re never eating the girls, that was NEVER an option, but over here there is a service which takes away your old chooks for a fee to live out their lives on a happy farm somewhere. Call me cynical, but I never quite believe them.. ;-)
They have been loyal friends. They are yours for life!!
Glenda, they’re not quite like dogs, they don’t reciprocate affection like your babies do. I’m sure if the situation was reversed, they wouldn’t hesitate to eat us. :) But they have been loyal, and lovely, so they get to stay.
God bless the girls… sounds like they have earned their retirement. I’m not sure what I’d do in your boots, Celia.
Lizzy, it’s been a tricky decision. As I was saying to Doc above, there is a service here which takes the chooks away for a fee (I think it’s $20 each!!) and lets them “live out their lives” on a farm somewhere. I’m too cynical to believe that actually works, and even if they were added to a larger flock of old birds, I’d hate to think of the girls having to fight to establish their place in the pecking order at their advanced ages!
How could you get rid of them???? They are family!
Deb, you’ve had chooks, you know that at some point we have to make a decision like this. But you’re right, they are a part of the family now. :)
I have had them and had to make the same decisions…and it is really difficult. We did try killing one for food. My younger brother called us murderers and we all felt very guilty and couldn’t do it again.
Great Post – there are many reasons hens stop producing eggs and one factor is age! Slowly introduce new hens and you will have eggs once again – Good Luck:)
Renee, the chooks we have are bred to be laying hens, so they make lots of eggs for a limited time, then stop. We work on making their relatively short lives as enjoyable as possible for them! :)
We have come to the same decision. We have free ranging chooks over our property. They are now 4 years old, we still get occasional eggs, although we sometimes have to work hard to find them! We discussed in length about giving them the chop…..but we decided that they really don’t require much from us and they aren’t good to eat so we are not going to cull for the sake of burying. Their ‘retirement’ is a thank you from us for filling our bellies over the past few years and performing some pest control duties. They are slowing dropping in numbers due to natural causes (hawk, old age etc) we will soon get a new flock in – but I know what you mean, i had to buy eggs for the first time in 4 years last week – was difficult pulling them off the shop shelf!!
I’m really not looking forward to buying eggs! Thanks for understanding our dilemma so well.. :)
Oh I AM glad you are going to let your dear chooky girls die of old age. They are still excellent pest exterminators I bet :-) BTW I changed my username if you’re wondering :-)
Merryl, yes the chookies get to hang about for as long as they can. At the moment, they’re still digging like crazy, will see how they go as their protein needs reduce with the stopping of egg production…
Great post and pics – your girls have such character… I had a feeling you would swing the way you did. Everything is circumstance, and as you say no judgement but if whatever you do you do is with kindness, everyone & everything is much better for it. As you say, the eggs were only just one part of their contibution to your household.
ED, thank you! In the end, it wasn’t a hard decision to make at all.. ;-)
Much to my husband’s disgust Celia, I’m with you. They give so much of themselves that I would feel awful getting rid of them. Our chooks are all different ages, so we don’t notice the reduced egg laying so much. My three ‘rescue’ Isas are all still laying after more than two years (for which I’m grateful) – but I’m sure they do it just to show up the ‘prettier’, more fussy girls.
Meag, we still get about five eggs a week, so at least some of the girls are still laying a bit. But it’s getting to the point where any major cake project is going to require a trip to the shops, and I’m not looking forward to that! :)
Oh for a moment I thought we were going to see the girls on a plate. I was going to be sad but respect you for it but still sad!
Good for you Celia. What a lovely place for retirement!
Claire, thank you darling, it’s nice to know you’d have been supportive whichever way we decided to go! :)
I’ve always said that we’ll eat them if and when the time comes. But I’m just not sure how we’ll do that. Like you I know all their personalities, their quirks and go in and chat to them everyday. I’m not sure I could bring myself to kill them.
Clare, I wish you luck with that – we started out with the same thinking, but fell in love with our chooks! :)
It’s a choice you have to make. To be honest, once you’ve named them, that’s it!
We kept chickens when I was small and my father was not at all soft hearted and taught me (at about 10 years old) how to dispatch a chicken!
Our chickens were kept when there was rationing and there was not really any room for sentiment. Today things are different – and thank goodness!
Having said that, my daughter has still not completely forgiven me for feeding her rabbit when she was a child (she’s over 50 now).
I blame Beatrix Potter.
Pat, I’m sure if times were tougher, we’d be making a different decision – at the moment we still buy grains to feed our chooks, even when they’re not producing. Not something the previous generation would have approved of! :)
I thought this post was going to end with a photo of a large pot. How lovely for your girls to heading into retirement. I’m sure introducing new birds is going to provide excellent material for posts and I’ll look forward to reading all about it. Very sorry not to be be able to give you any advice! xx
Charlie, it won’t be for a while, I suspect – the four girls were all looking very healthy this morning!!
We have had this same dilemma and did actually dispatch our first herd of chooks when they stopped laying, but I felt so bad about it – for all the reasons you cite – that I’ve never been able to do it again. Now we just keep adding to the numbers. We maxed out about 18 months ago with 13 birds, but a couple of the old ones soon died happily in their beds and we are currently at 9 birds, one of whom is a rooster.
He came to us by accident, but has certainly made the introduction of new birds much easier. While not the worlds most assertive chap, he does stop the girls from getting too unpleasant with newcomers. And as for introducing new birds to the flock – my preferred method is to chuck them in in and not look too closely at what is happening. I can’t really do anything to settle the new ones in – it just takes time and does calm down fairly soon.
Interestingly, I had lunch on the weekend with a free-range egg producer and poultry grower and she never kills her old birds either. They just happily scratch around until called to the great roost in the sky!
Amanda, I wonder how the free range producers manage it – at some point it must become commercially unviable to keep housing and feeding chooks that aren’t producing! I’m glad your rooster is helping – from the photos I saw on your IG feed last year, he’s a most attractive fellow! :)
We did the same thing at the community garden … reckoned the old gals had earned the right to live out retirement peacefully in a beautiful organic environment. A few chooks were dumped nearby – struggling in the wild, poor things – so we took them in and they settled into the group surprisingly quickly. For me, personally, the eggs are just a bonus. It’s having the girls around that really counts.
Rachel, as you know, the chooks do a lot of the gardening for us, and it makes a huge difference! We like having them there too! :)
No chooks here , no comment from me. (guess what I am thinking :) )
Oh yes.. xxx :)
We have 9 girls who range from 3yrs to 6yrs and get 3-4 eggs a day. No. 10 is blind, has been for over a year, but stays healthy and loves her greens and sunflower seed so I put her on her own in a little area where she can see the others. She had trouble getting in and out of the chook house and the others were picking on her. I haven’t named any of this lot, simply because as Isa Browns they look so alike. I will let them scratch out their years, however, I understand your problem when space is an issue. You named them too! When my girls pass away I plant a tree on top of them. So pleased you are keeping them. Joy
Joy, we don’t have many, so it really wasn’t that hard a decision. I guess I just decided that the chooks were more important than the eggs. The weather has been so strange – maybe they’ll pick up laying again when the days lengthen. ISA browns are quite similar, but after all the hours we’ve spent staring at them, our four girls are quite distinctive – in both appearance AND personality! It’s given us a new appreciation of how individual and different animals can be.
Our egg production has slowed at the moment but I have my fingers crossed that it is a temporary lull. If not ours will go to the farm, which is not a euphemism. Our current chickens were bred by my father and I figure he can have them back when they stop being useful. There they will have the room to live out their days and he has more than enough laying to not notice if the extras don’t. I recognise I am lucky though to have this solution.
Tania, that’s a wonderful solution! :)
Oops – I should have said “where she can hear the others” . Joy
Joy, you’ve really been very kind to her! Bless! x
If you had more land they could be just used as tractors and weeders. Sadly I don’t have enough space to offer a home. My previous house share person had eight which he did not maintain too well. They did a lot of damage to decorative areas of the garden and one escaped, She was returned six months later by the neighbourhood children and she was a fat as a pig! I don’t know if she had started laying again but perhaps she had been living on dog and cat food.
Frances, they ARE weeders! The idea of a fat chook fed on pet food made me laugh out loud! :)
I think it’ll be nice for your girls to have a good retirement — they are getting something that millions of egg producing chooks in Australia don’t get to do – an old age. I think this will bring you some good chook karma with the big chicken in the sky.
Thanks Mel. I’m not looking for karma, though the thought did cross my mind that if the situation was reversed, our girls would have no problem whatsoever with eating US! :D
Very much agree about you getting heaps of chook karma! And let them ‘teach’ the young brood to arrive and feel all important!! [Huh, funny arriving here tho’ from an Irish post teaching how to make the bestest roast . . .: i better not mention the word . . . :) ! ]
Eha, I suspect that’s a little optimistic – I don’t know that they’ll be teaching the new chooks – more like beating them into submission! :)
I’m so glad your girls get to live Happily Ever After Celia! With just a few it’s too hard to be tough about it. When dad had his cows we named them after meals- Brisket, Stroganoff, Stew, Chuck, etc. That made it a bit easier, but then they weren’t as cute as your girlies :)
Becca, you made me laugh out loud!! I told Pete our next lot will be called Cacciatore, Chicken Kiev and Colonel’s Secret Recipe! :)
I had 3 beautiful girls who were about 4 and a half years old and still laying well. Didn’t have to worry about the old age thing though because a rotten fox got in and killed them all. Very upsetting. Thought my place was fox proof, but I was wrong. I have high tin fences all around my 3/4 acre block. Old foxy climbed over the gate at the front, chook pen is right down the back, then scaled walnut tree and went in through the top of the pen. Sounds extreme I know, but there was evidence that was how he got in. Will eventually get some more. I do miss my girls.
I’m so sorry to hear that, Di! I worry about foxes all the time, the odd one has been spotted around here. I hope you get some more chooks eventually!
Celia, your chooks should be taking a break from laying now until early spring. They should also be moulting and replacing their feathers, so will look rejuvenated in a couple of months. Their daylength clock has switched off the egg machine to allow them to cope with less food (insects and green stuff) and to conserve energy. Also it helps them to recover the energy and calcium reserves they have been putting into eggs. They will very likely switch on again for a burst of laying in spring.
So glad you are keeping yours anyway. I am lucky to have plenty of room in a large rural garden, so can keep the old girls and add some POL pullets every 2-3 years, which will lay through winter. I see you plan to stick with Isa browns due to their shorter lifespans, however I was going to advise you to get a hardier backyard breed (like Australorps, Plymouth Rock, etc) and mix up the breeds because then they are less likely to all be doing the same thing at the same time.
And did you know you can freeze eggs when there is a glut? You can break and lightly beat them, then freeze in small batches for baking. I use freezer bag-lined muffin tins, then turn them inside out and seal them when frozen.
Did you say yours eat oxalis bulbs? That’s a great advert for keeping free-range chooks and I’ll pass it on.
Thanks for all the great tips, Tassie girl! Pete is keen to get more ISA browns – he’s particularly fond of the cross-breed, as they’re extremely friendly and don’t get the least bit broody (which I believe black hens can do). They are moulting at the moment, so hopefully you’re right – either way, we’ll find out, as the chooks aren’t going anywhere! :)
Even though you have them for a practical purpose of egg laying, they have become an important part of your way of life. Good luck Celia with introducing new layers to the old girls :)
Tandy, I’ll let you all know how we go! :) xx
So pleased they are staying with you, I was getting a bit upset until reading that bit. The girls will still contribute as they scratch away and fertilise the garden while giving joy and serenity as you watch them.
Marg, thank you! I’m glad they’re staying too! :)
Sorry, Celia, I’ve no experience nor knowledge to draw upon. You’ve such a large number of followers, I’m sure more than a few will be here to offer suggestions. Good luck!
Thanks John! x
They never tell you about when they stop laying do they? I mean in all honesty, I never considered it which sounds stupid but of course they can’t lay eggs forever…
No, eventually all chooks reach Henopause… hehehe
My girls were my friends too and when they got tired I waited for one to get broody and bought some fertilized eggs. The babies were born and she introduced them all as her children and all were happy. We had to give 2 boys to the local poultry society because we lived in town. I couldn’t kill one. I know it’s livestock but they were my pals.
Maureen, that’s the problem with eggs – you can end up with roosters! And they won’t let us have them here in suburbia! :)
You and Pete have definitely made the best decision Celia. I get far too attached to animals so I would battle to make any sort of decision, except for retirement for the girls.
Have a super day.
:-) Mandy xo
Mandy, you are very kindhearted, bless you.. :)
I just keep my hens until they fall off their perch or start to look miserable (at which point it seems kinder to dispatch them). When egg production tails off, I just get some more hens – I slip them into the henhouse at dusk and have never had a problem. Like TassieGirl, I’d mix the breeds and now I’m going to follow her other piece of advice and freeze some of my surplus.
Anne, that was what Linda suggested as well – stick them up on the roost in the dark and that should help. Lord knows how I’ll sleep that night.. ;-)
Tough decision, Celia. They’ve done very well to keep going as long as they did. It’s easier when they don’t have names. I had grand plans for building a chook retirement home in the front paddock but the amount of feed I’m going through changed my mind. So I went with the axe option. I’ve also just realised that the chook I’ve eagerly been waiting to lay an egg is a rooster so he’s getting the chop too. Roast chicken on Sunday.
Jo, I can see how you ended up with that decision – the feed is expensive! x
A tricky decision Celia. Like Anne we usually keep our chooks until they ‘pass on’ or get miserable. If a particular chicken is obviously not laying and looking healthy it will end up as roast chicken. It becomes expensive to feed chooks that have stopped laying doesn’t it? But, they are hard little workers and they produce an enormous amount of eggs over a lifetime, bless them :)
Jane, you’re running a proper farm, where livestock is livestock, so I really do respect that decision, because it really IS expensive to keep buying feed. I think we can only really to do it because we have so few birds. And yes, can’t complain about what they do around the garden! :)
Celia, I get my eggs from a “hobby farmer” who raises and shows fancy and exotic chickens – with the side advantage of lots of eggs.
He brought me a basket of eggs this morning (it’s Wednesday here) and I mentioned your dilemma. He says he has a lot of pets running around, but as they spend a lot of time in an alfalfa field, foraging on their own, they don’t cost that much to maintain.
He also mentioned that he has several Australorps from a breeder who imported stock from Australia a few years ago and so far they have proved to be much better producers than most of his other breeds.
He has three crossbred Brahma/Orpington hens that were fantastic layers for four or five years – they are now 9 years old and he maintains them as brooders because they are huge and can cover a lot of eggs and chicks and he has found that chicks incubated and hatched “naturally” do much better “socially” than those incubated in machines.
I have been to his “ranch” and seen the three “Dream girls” and they are really BIG.
I don’t know how many breeds he has but the eggs are colorful – from white to a pinkish one with tiny red specks and through the full range of beige and browns-some very dark, like chocolate, to greeny-blue.
He also has Guinea hens, ducks, geese and now, since building a huge new barn, is raising game birds.
He has one rooster that is 13 years old – a Jersey Giant, black feathers with green iridescence and black feet and legs. His first show fowl.
He really hates to butcher any of his “pets”
Andie, how absolutely wonderful to be able to buy from a producer like this! Someone who genuinely cares for his birds and has such an interesting range and variety! Good on him, and good for you! :)
I would make the same decision as you.
Thanks Norma.. :) xx
Celia, wonderful to see your beautiful girls.
Pete will be pleased to know one of the girls at work asked me if I could make some more of his favourite chocolate chip biscuits!…….she told me they’re the best chocolate biscuits ever.
Elaine, my Pete will be pleased to hear that, although if I tell him, he might nag me to make him another batch of “his” cookies.. :)
Oh dear Celia, that did make us laugh. We’ve had the same discussion with our chooks too and got the same reply! However, we eventually got down to one chook, now called Her Maj and lo and behold she started to lay again and then became broody. She started some very strange behaviour and made distinctly different sounds. We couldn’t get fertilised eggs so got week old chicks instead. Three little black ones the same as Her Maj. We were surprised to find she was quite shocked and not delighted at all. But that night there was a tremendous storm and the temperature dropped markedly. My Peter went down to the chook house, worried about the chicks, and tucked each one under Her Maj – who has taken to sleeping in a nesting box. To our relief, in the morning there were three fluffy little heads poking out of her feathers and Her Maj has become a very fussy Mum. I think sustainability would require us to get ‘meat chickens’ and regard them differently from our egg laying chooks…… My Pete says he could do the deed……
Jan, the things we do! Tucking the chicks in late at night under a sleeping chook – can’t wait to tell Pete that one! :)
One of the reasons my friend got the Australorps was because the breeder told him they were naturally broody and very “laid back” – unlike some of the more excitable breeds.
There are a lot of hawks in this area so he has runs that are covered with chicken wire.
The hawks are protected species so no one can shoot them but there are various methods for scaring them off – besides, they keep the rabbit population down, which farmers like.
I can see how broody would be important if you wanted to raise chicks and protect them from hawks! We choose the ISAs for the exact opposite reason, they don’t seem to care about their eggs at all, which is great, as we don’t want to get pecked when we collect them! :)
I love how you ask Rosemary for her opinion on their future! As if you could serve her on a plate. Cakes are over rated anyway.
Hehehe…all true! And no creature alive can match the stare down Rosemary gives when she’s determined.. :)
Really interesting – thanks for being so open about your dilemma. I do believe that there is an exchange with domestic farm animals – we give them food/ look after them in exchange for their meat/milk/eggs etc. Giving them a good life is a responsibility – understand your reasons for keeping them but also understand if you dispatched them (I know you won’t). The happy hen keeping service also sounds fishy to me!
Sally, it’s one of those topics that if I think too hard about it, I’ll end up a vegetarian. Suffice to say the girls aren’t going anywhere – even if the hen retirement option was legit, I’d hate the thought of our four chooks at their advanced age having to battle it out in a large flock to re-establish their place in the pecking order!
Celia – I too have menopausal chickens – Iris and Jezebel. They are looking so lovely and healthy and very very pleased with themselves. Last weekend there was discussion outside their house about “dispatch” and a visitor made a joke about chicken soup (I would have covered the girls ears if I could have) and amazingly eggs have appeared this week. The girls are making a final effort to prove their worth. We are blessed with a large hen house and run as well as a big back yard so we will retire these girls and introduce some new ones – just need to select the names starting with “K” “L” and “M”.