In my experience... natural light, times and seasons grow far healthier chickens and they produce more eggs over a long life.
Below... This is my uncle's chicken house just down the road... Produces fertilized eggs which are trucked to a facility that hatches them. Those chicks are supplied to other farmers who grow the chickens that are destined for our local market or the kfc.
Anyway, these laying houses run 24/7. The lights never go off. Production cycles last about 5 months. A house starts freshly sanitized, cleaned, new wood chips. Then 25K hens and 5K roosters are brought in.
The lights go on and the laying starts. In about 5 months the laying will slow noticably... to the point all of them will be sent for pet food. Then a new batch of 25K hens and 5K roosters will be brought into the clean laying house for the next cycle.
The interesting part.. In winter, in spite of round the clock light, constant temperature and a never ending line of feed trucks.. egg production is still noticeably less than in summer months.
Animals are living organisms with seasonal cycles just like us. I wouldn't try to ride a horse 24/7, it'd need rest. Chickens do also, mine stay healthy, live long lives and lay great eggs. Whats the old sayin'? 'Don't mess with mother nature'. Just like you can shorten the life of a horse with hard labor, so to a chicken.
Need more eggs? I'd get a few more chickens and leave the lights off. I avoid eggs that come from a place like this..
Below... This is my uncle's chicken house just down the road... Produces fertilized eggs which are trucked to a facility that hatches them. Those chicks are supplied to other farmers who grow the chickens that are destined for our local market or the kfc.
Anyway, these laying houses run 24/7. The lights never go off. Production cycles last about 5 months. A house starts freshly sanitized, cleaned, new wood chips. Then 25K hens and 5K roosters are brought in.
The lights go on and the laying starts. In about 5 months the laying will slow noticably... to the point all of them will be sent for pet food. Then a new batch of 25K hens and 5K roosters will be brought into the clean laying house for the next cycle.
The interesting part.. In winter, in spite of round the clock light, constant temperature and a never ending line of feed trucks.. egg production is still noticeably less than in summer months.
Animals are living organisms with seasonal cycles just like us. I wouldn't try to ride a horse 24/7, it'd need rest. Chickens do also, mine stay healthy, live long lives and lay great eggs. Whats the old sayin'? 'Don't mess with mother nature'. Just like you can shorten the life of a horse with hard labor, so to a chicken.
Need more eggs? I'd get a few more chickens and leave the lights off. I avoid eggs that come from a place like this..
Last edited:
