"Charlie Pridham" wrote in message
"Keith (Dorset)" wrote in message

As a bumpkin I still have no idea how long they live... or lay
for?

... that's assuming of course they die a 'natural' death.

I never had the heart to cull mine so I can say they do lay some
eggs when
old but it is not a meaningful quantity after about 4 years.
We used to find the first laying year to be the most productive but
that in
the second the eggs were heavier although less in number, after that
you
just get less. In our case this was complicated by the fact that
young hens
will often use the nest boxes provided but the wily old birds
favoured the
hedges so not only did they lay less but you could never find them
all!!

I'm like you Charlie. I hate killing my old chooks. I get about 75%
egg laying return from my chooks which must be about 5 years at least.
That more than I can cope with and I give away lots of eggs. The eggs
are a reasonable size but I have noticed that the shells are now
beginning to get thin. It might be time to cull them, but they still
good service turning over weeds and making it into compostable
material so no real hurry. I recall reading about a chook that was 12
years old - it wasn't laying but he point of the story was that the
bird had been operated onas a young pullet (for reasons which now
escape me) and hadn't laid an egg since the op - it was a pet but
apparently well at 12.