Rotating Laying Hens on Pasture

Rotating laying hens on pasture is a slower clock than a broiler tractor. The hens live on the grass. They scratch. They need a yard sized for the days they will stand on it, then a rest long enough for that yard to come back. The eggs tell you if you got the size wrong.

Layers are not broilers

A broiler pull is a short stay in a floorless house. No net. The birds are gone in weeks. A laying flock is an egg-mobile. The move interval on the sheet is longer. Fence is poultry net, counted in 164-foot rolls. Shelter square footage is higher per bird because the hens are there to stay, not to finish.

Do not copy the broiler move onto the layers. A daily tractor pull undersizes an egg yard, or it burns labor you do not have. Do not copy the layer stay onto broilers either. Same pasture tool. Different breed sheet, different intake, different house.

Size the paddock from intake

Daily dry matter is the start. Hens eat a set amount of dry matter per bird per day. Multiply by head. Multiply by the days you intend to leave them on that break. That product, on the stand you actually have, is the paddock. A rich spring flush carries more days than a July slump. Same flock. Smaller yard in summer, or a shorter stay. The sheet does that math.

Undersize the yard and the hens strip it before the planned move. You will see bare centers and a scratch pit at the door. Oversize it and they camp on the house side, manure piles there, and the far half of the net never gets grazed. The move interval and the paddock have to match. One without the other is a sacrifice lot with a schedule.

Rest that keeps both sides working

Rest is how long the paddock stays empty after the hens leave. It is not the move interval. A two-day or three-day stay does not earn a shorter rest. The grass needs leaf area back before the next graze. Come back early and the hens hit regrowth that has not rebuilt. Intake drops. The stand thins. Next season's flush is smaller.

The rest window is on the pasture sheet, spring and summer separately. Summer is the long one. Stay off the paddock for that window. The hens can be productive on a new break while the last one grows. That is the rotation. Moving the house without an empty paddock behind it is just relocating the damage.

What the eggs say

Yolk color is a forage report. Dark orange yolks mean the hens are hitting green leaf, not just the grain in the feeder. Pale yolks on a flock that should be on grass mean the break is already gone, or they are not ranging. Look at the paddock before you change the feed.

A drop in lay right after a move usually means the new yard is bare, hot, or short on cover. The hens spent the day walking, not eating. Shell quality is mostly calcium and the hen's age. Do not blame the grass for a thin shell. Do blame the grass for pale yolks and for a yard that is dirt by the second morning.

Dirty eggs climb when the hens are standing in manure. That is a late move or a yard that was too small. The fix is the next break, not a wash line.