The Chicken Keeper's Year

Moult, heat, winter and what to expect month by month

5 minIntermediateUpdated 2026-10-23 The Chicken Keeper's Year

You will learn

Predict when laying rises, dips and stops
Manage a flock through moult and through a heatwave
Plan coop jobs for the right season instead of the wrong one

⚠️ Never force a moult or break broodiness by withholding food, water or light. It is cruel and illegal in many jurisdictions.

⚠️ A collapsed, flat-out bird in heat is a veterinary emergency. Cool gradually with cool water on legs and wattles, never ice or full immersion.

⚠️ Ventilate the coop all winter. Sealing it causes ammonia build-up, frostbite and respiratory disease.

Laying follows daylight

A hen's laying is driven mainly by day length. Production climbs from late winter as days pass roughly ten to twelve hours, peaks in spring, dips in the hottest weeks of summer, and stops almost completely during the autumn moult. A good hybrid gives 280 to 320 eggs in her first full year, a dual-purpose breed 180 to 220, and each following year is about 15 to 20 percent lower. A flock that floods you with eggs in April and gives nothing in November is not broken. Plan your kitchen around the pattern rather than fighting it.

💡 Pencil the date on every egg as you collect. After one year you will know your own flock's curve exactly.

Spring: broodies, mites and chicks

From March the flock wakes up. Laying climbs fast, so collect twice a day and rotate the oldest eggs into the kitchen. Broody hens appear: flat in the nest, growling, breast feathers plucked. Decide early whether you want chicks, because breaking a broody gets harder the longer she sits. Red mite starts multiplying as soon as nights warm, so begin the weekly white-paper check on perch ends now rather than in June. This is also the season to clean out thoroughly, rest a section of run, and check every metre of fencing before predators start feeding young.

💡 Hatch or buy chicks in spring so they are fully feathered before real heat and laying before the following winter.

Summer: heat is the danger

Chickens are comfortable from about 10 to 24 degrees. Stress starts near 28, becomes serious above 32, and above 35 birds die. There are no sweat glands, only panting and heat radiating from comb, wattles and legs. Provide deep all-day shade over a third of the run, several drinkers refilled with cool water two or three times a day, a shallow pan to stand in, and feed at dawn and dusk rather than midday. Watch for open-beak panting, wings held away from the body and pale floppy combs. Collect eggs three times a day in real heat.

💡 A frozen water bottle dropped into the drinker each morning keeps the water cool until late afternoon.

Autumn: the moult

From late summer, hens drop their feathers and grow a new set. It looks like a disaster in the coop and the eggs stop, because feathers are around 85 percent protein and a hen cannot build both at once. A fast moult takes four to six weeks, a slow one up to three months. Raise the feed to roughly 18 to 20 percent protein for that period, keep calcium available but do not push it, and handle the birds as little as possible since new pin feathers carry a blood supply and hurt. Never force a moult by withdrawing food, water or light.

💡 The scruffiest, fastest moulters are usually your best layers. Tidy late moulters often are not.

Winter: damp, dark and predators

Cold is rarely the problem; damp and frozen water are. Keep high ventilation open all winter, top up deep dry bedding rather than stripping it, and use two drinkers so an iced one is never the only one. A roofed section of run with deep wood chip keeps a wet Portuguese winter from turning the ground to mud that both predators and coccidia love. Predator pressure peaks now, as wild food gets scarce and dusk arrives early, so lock up on time every night. Use the quiet weeks to review costs, losses and next year's flock size.

💡 Decide deliberately whether to add morning light for winter eggs or let the flock rest. Both are valid, but pick one.

Check yourself

Your hens stop laying in October and look ragged. What is happening?

Feathers are about 85 percent protein, so a moulting hen cannot lay at the same time. Laying returns once the new feathers are grown.

What should you feed a hen in heavy moult?

Feather growth needs protein, not calcium, and restricting food to force a moult is cruel and banned in many places.

Which is the earliest visible sign of heat stress?

Open-beak panting and lifted wings are early warnings. A flat-out bird with a stretched neck is already an emergency.

What is the biggest winter risk to a backyard flock?

Chickens tolerate cold well. Moist ammonia-laden air causes frostbite and respiratory disease, and a hen without water goes off lay within days.

Try it for real: Build your own flock calendar

Write down the month you expect moult, heat risk and the winter laying dip where you live
Put three coop jobs into the calendar: spring deep clean, summer shade, autumn repairs
Set a weekly reminder for the perch-end mite check from March to October
Record egg counts weekly for a month and compare with the expected curve
List what you would do tomorrow if the forecast said 38 degrees