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Healthy laying hens are made, not bought. Even the best stock from a reputable breeder will fade if the basics slip, so it pays to think about the whole picture before you bring your pullets home. Point-of-lay birds arrive at around sixteen to twenty weeks, and a good one should have bright eyes, a clean dry vent, smooth legs and a lively interest in everything around her.
Choose with your head as well as your heart. Modern hybrids such as the ISA Brown, Black Rock or Lohmann will happily lay you three hundred eggs a year, while traditional breeds like the Sussex, Wyandotte or Marans lay fewer but tend to be hardier, longer-lived and better at coping with a damp British winter. Whichever you pick, start with at least three hens — they are flock birds, and a solitary hen is a stressed hen.
Hens cope far better with cold than with damp and draughts. Your coop wants to be dry, well ventilated above head height, and built from something you can scrub. Allow roughly 30cm by 30cm of floor space per bird inside, plus perches giving 25cm of length each, and one nest box between every four or five hens.
The outside run is where most problems start. Two square metres per bird is a sensible minimum, more if the ground cannot be rotated. Move the run onto fresh grass regularly, or use a movable ark, to break the worm and coccidiosis cycle. Line the house with wood shavings or hemp bedding rather than straw, clean it out weekly, and scrub the perches and corners monthly with a poultry-safe disinfectant.
Check for red mite after dark with a torch, running your finger along the underside of perch ends and joints. A tell-tale smear of blood means action: strip the house, treat every crevice, and repeat a week later to catch the newly hatched mites.
A good quality layers' pellet, formulated at around sixteen to eighteen per cent protein, should form the backbone of the diet. Offer it ad lib in a hanging feeder set at about shoulder height so the hens cannot scratch through it and foul it. Expect each bird to eat roughly 120g a day, a little more in cold weather and when moulting.
The single most common mistake in backyard flocks is over-treating. A scattering of mixed corn, a few garden weeds or a handful of sunflower seeds in the afternoon is fine, but constant extras dilute the pellets and cut both protein and calcium intake. The result is fewer eggs, thin shells and fat, underconditioned hens.
Under UK animal by-product rules, kitchen scraps from a domestic kitchen should not be fed to poultry, so keep to garden greens, windfall fruit in moderation and purpose-made treats. Never offer mouldy or fermented food, raw potato, avocado, chocolate or anything salty.
Hens need two quite different types of grit, and they are best offered in separate small pots rather than mixed into the feed.
Greens add vitamins and give bored hens something to do. Hang a cabbage, a bunch of kale or some cauliflower leaves at beak height so they stay clean and dry. Weeds such as chickweed and dandelion are free and much appreciated. A couple of handfuls per bird a day is ample.
Water matters more than anything else on this list. A laying hen drinks between 250ml and half a litre a day, and considerably more in a heatwave. Use a drinker raised off the ground to keep droppings out, refresh it daily, and scrub it weekly with a mild disinfectant followed by a thorough rinse. Hens will not drink what tastes stale, and a dehydrated hen stops laying within days.
Five minutes in the morning and five in the evening will teach you what normal looks like, and that is how you catch trouble early. Watch them move, watch them eat, and glance at the droppings under the perch.
If a hen looks off colour, move her to a warm, quiet crate with food and water and keep her apart from the flock. Most minor upsets settle within a day; if she is no better after twenty-four to forty-eight hours, call a vet who sees poultry.
Worm your flock twice a year, in spring and again in autumn, using a licensed poultry wormer and observing the egg withdrawal period on the label. Keep a simple notebook of dates, treatments, laying numbers and any illness — patterns soon become obvious, and it is invaluable if you ever need veterinary advice.
From late summer you can expect the annual moult. Laying slows or stops, feathers scatter everywhere, and the hens look frankly scruffy for a few weeks. Support them rather than pushing them: keep pellets in front of them, add a little extra protein, and make sure oyster shell is always available. Never try to force laying through a moult.
Through the short days of winter, laying naturally tails off as light drops below about fourteen hours. You can supplement with a timed light in the coop if you wish, but many smallholders prefer to let the hens rest, keeping them busy instead with hanging greens, a dust bath of dry earth and wood ash, and a sheltered, dry run. Do the small things well and consistently, and you will have a flock that rewards you with a steady supply of fresh eggs and a great deal of quiet pleasure besides.
The Cottage Meadow shares practical, down-to-earth guidance on british cottage gardening, rural crafts and simple countryside living for readers across the UK.
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