Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Brown-egg-laying breeds tend to do the most laying in winter and spring. If it gets
hot in the summer, the brown egg layers will lay fewer eggs because of their heavier
body style. Of course, this all depends upon the strain of a particular breed.
The best brown-egg-laying chickens include the crosses Golden Comets, Black Stars,
and Red Stars. Most of these are very similar — just different lines selected for partic-
ular traits and used to create the different trade names. Red Stars, Comets, and Hardy
Concords are all fairly similar in looks and all begin to produce eggs at around 16 to 18
weeks of age under ideal conditions.
Golden Comet
These
crossbred
(hybrid) chickens are amazing in their egg-production abilities;
their eggs gain size quickly and they produce great numbers of them. The catch with
crosses, however, is that you must keep them on a fairly stable ration of high-protein
feed. You cannot do a lot of experimenting with feed rations without suffering some loss
in productivity. Don't crowd these birds or cannibalism will result.
I have raised different varieties of brown-egg crossbreds over the years and have
found major problems with cannibalism, feather picking, and poor egg production when
I varied from a commercially prepared laying ration. When given a prepared laying ra-
tion, they did very well, performed beautifully, but they did not have a long laying span.
During their second year, their production slowed, and usually by the third year, though
they were eating the same amount of food, they produced still fewer eggs.
