And as the others, these also lay about 1 egg per day each, except when in molt. Each year chickens molt, or lose the older feathers, and grow new ones. Most hens stop producing eggs until after the molt is completed. What we provide our hens as chicken feed is specially made to meet all of the nutritional needs of a chicken. The main ingredient in chicken food is grain, usually a blend of wheat, corn and barley.
Grain provides calories and protein.
The amount of each ingredient in the feed is changed slightly as the chicken gets older. They are peovided also with fresh water daily, fresh hay and scratch. Scratch is a mixture of cracked corn and oyster shell calcium to improve the quality of the shell of the eggs. The hens are free to roam in and out of their housing. Once the chicks are born and delivered to the feed mill, I bring them home and put them into what I refer to as a brooding house.