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Chicken keepers

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Original poster

What do people do when chickens no longer laying?

53 replies

NPPF · 19/08/2012 21:41

Mine haven't laid for some time and are about 3 years old. Who dispatches theirs? I'm considering it but I don't know if I can bear it. I know someone who can do it for me. I'm too much of a coward to actually do it myself.

My life has significantly changed since I got them and I am finding them a real burden now. I doubt I could rehome non laying hens.

I know this sounds really mean but they have had a completely free range life. Anyone who keeps hens or eats supermarket eggs is contributing to culling. (A male has been culled for every female and laying hens get culled at 18 months)

Am I being awful?

OP posts:
imsotired · 19/08/2012 22:22

duchesse-- you didnt meet my chickens... they were very rewarding pets, they used to follow my dd around the garden, they recognised thier own names, my dd had races with them... I even have a photo of them having a picnic, with each of the chickens waiting their turn for the feed to be put on thier plate!

my dd cried when they died, we had to use our garden incinerater to burn them and then she burried the ashes! they were very rewarding pets indeed!

beachyhead · 19/08/2012 22:23

Think Fox cleared up the mess himself......she didn't mention it....

Or like Viva, take them, like Snow White, to the woods..... They might meet dwarfs Grin

TrinityIsAFuckingRhino · 19/08/2012 22:24

My hens sit on our laps and be tickled. They also like sitting on the kids heads.

I got them AS pets who also might give us lovely eggs.

TrinityIsAFuckingRhino · 19/08/2012 22:25

I used to have 15 and they never tried to kill each other.

Original poster
NPPF · 19/08/2012 22:27

What happened to your 15? Genuine question, just curious.

OP posts:
sleepdodger · 19/08/2012 22:28

Our last girl went on Friday, after a bad run in with infection dh did the kind thing Sad

herladyship · 19/08/2012 22:35

we have two pekin bantams aged 7 that still lay, also have 2 hybrid hens aged approx 5 that are 'retired' and four younger, more productive hens

Once past laying, we agreed they would live out their days with us.. I don't find hens any bother or much expense to keep thoug. Definitely wouldnt eat them as chicken tastes blergh at best of times!

TrinityIsAFuckingRhino · 20/08/2012 08:06

It was 6 years ago and I was struggling pg with dd3, Dh away on a submarine, depression worsening.

I looked for and found a retirement type place for them, lovely lady came and got them. She takes any and lets them live out their lives

duchesse · 20/08/2012 08:12

Cute pets!! Grin

Original poster
NPPF · 20/08/2012 09:03

Interesting, Duchesse. I wonder if we Might get a similar problem here.

Trinity, I am struggling to cope with mine now after many changes in my circumstances over the last 3 years. I live in a very urban area and I don't know anyone who could take them. Perhaps if I lived in the countryside it would be different.

OP posts:
Original poster
NPPF · 20/08/2012 09:07

I am now a single parent of 3. I am about to start teacher training and we will be living on a student loan for the next year. I am only doing teacher training because I have had to change career due to the recession affecting my business. I will have long days and I could do without the extra burden of the chickens. They are starting to die off anyway but I could be left with remaining ones for a few more years. I just can't face it.

OP posts:
pigsinmud · 20/08/2012 09:20

I'm rapidly going off the idea of chickens after duchesse's description.

If I did get them I would look after them until they die.

Original poster
NPPF · 20/08/2012 11:46

shilke, I guess it depends on the individual but they are a pain in the ass if you are not getting any eggs.
Also, it can be tricky getting people to look after them when you are away. It is a little awkward asking people to clear up a load of shit for you Hmm

OP posts:
VivaLeBeaver · 20/08/2012 11:59

I had nightmares about my cockerals been in the woods, alone and scared and hungry huddled in a tree in the rain. Sad

duchesse · 20/08/2012 12:00

Some breeds are a lot more short lived than others. If you get commercial crosses, they are bred to lay extremely well for about 2 years, and then they die. They are quite the best compromise to my mind. They also tend to be a lot calmer than most breeds.

My pure bred araucanas are mad as boxes of frogs, refuse to sleep in the coop, preferring to roost in trees, get eaten by foxes, next in hedges and under piles of twigs out in the open, are never ever tame (not even the ones I hatched in the kitchen- so much for imprinting!), are quite aggressive to each other. The only advantage to them is that they look gorgeous and lay lovely blue eggs. When they stop laying and become just bad tempered and manky I am sorely tempted to wring their bloody necks. but I don't because I want them to live out their excessively long lives (about 8 y) in peace.

MrsTomHardy · 20/08/2012 12:00

I have 6 hens and i look at them as pets.

2 of them are about 2 1/2 years old now and 4 are baby Pekin Bantams and my kids and i love them. They follow us round the garden, my youngest picks them up and cuddles them.....
I can't imagine being without them now

Original poster
NPPF · 20/08/2012 20:41

I have just now I have seen a rat in the garden. They are going PDQ.

OP posts:
AmIjustcold · 22/08/2012 12:50

Mine are pets

lentilweavinghippy · 22/08/2012 13:00

Having read this thread I don't want chickens anymore!

QuietTiger · 26/08/2012 13:05

We've got a mish-mash of about 25 chickens of all breeds and ages here, along with 3 ancient ex battery hens. The ex-bats have stopped laying now they are about 3, but DH (mean, tough farmer) can't bring himself to dispatch them because he's fallen in love with them they are (to quote him) "too comical and entertaining".

There is something highly amusing about a cheeky brown hen chasing the cats through the cat flap into the kitchen because she's managed to escape again.

Reality here is, unless they are "ill" (at which point we dispatch them or they die) they stay until they die of old age. I'm genuinely not sure quite who is laying and isn't, but then we have a lot of young POL hens at the moment who are due to start laying in the next couple of months.

SundaeGirl · 26/08/2012 18:51

We have 10 hens and one isn't laying. I would like to dispatch it but can't because we share them with the excessively anthropomorphising neighbours and this one is one of their favourites. It's a proper nuisance to think we're going to be giving it feed and coop space for the next X years.

Hens are lovely pets but I'd be happy to put this one in a pot. She's already had a brilliant life above and beyond anything a commercially reared chicken. Don't feel bad, OP. Give them a good life and quick death when it suits you.

TunipTheVegemal · 27/08/2012 19:02

I am an evil chickenslayer. At least, I got my cleaner to kill one to teach me, so I could be sure I was doing it right, and I killed the other. I didn't feel any guiltier about the one I killed with my own hands because I know I did it quickly. I would have liked to let them live out their lives after they stopped laying, and if I had space for more I would have done, but I thought it through and since I wouldn't have room for any more layers it would have meant buying eggs and meat that I could not be sure had either had such a happy life or been killed as quickly, which kind of undermines the whole point of me keeping hens, so morally I simply couldn't think of a reason not to do it unless I also turned the whole family vegan.
The plucking is easy, the gutting a touch smelly but OMG it was also the best chicken I have ever eaten.
Some commercial free range flocks are now kept in really nice environments which are as nice as my garden, but even then they still cull the unproductive ones.
When I have a bigger garden I won't cull unproductive ones - I don't care about the cost of feed - but for now I am happy I am doing the right thing.

Original poster
NPPF · 28/08/2012 00:13

turnip Very good point!

I can't bring myself to do it yet

OP posts:
WithoutCaution · 01/11/2012 15:12

duchesse Shock we have 12 chickens who are are very rewarding, though that's probably because I was very bored and taught them all tricks. Can't believe your chickens can't be held or stroked I usually have a hard time getting them off my lap if I sit out in the garden

lurkingaround · 03/11/2012 21:34

Oh my! Have just read this thread and am now thoroughly gone off the 3 hens that are arriving next week! I haven't kept hens before, my garden is a piddly urban smallish garden and I now have visions of me being completely distressed by nasty noisy hens, never mind the strife with my lovely neighbours over the noise and mess!