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While a single specific cause is unknown, chronic egg laying is believed to be triggered by hormonal imbalances influenced by a series of external factors. [1] As in the domestic chicken, female parrots are capable of producing eggs without the involvement of a male – it is a biological process that may be triggered by environmental cues such as day length (days becoming longer, indicating ...
A common practice among hatcheries for egg-laying hens is the culling of newly hatched male chicks since they do not lay eggs and do not grow fast enough to be profitable for meat. There are plans to more ethically destroy the eggs before the chicks are hatched, using "in-ovo" sex determination. [52]
Chickens farmed primarily for eggs are called layer hens. The UK alone consumes more than 34 million eggs per day. [84] Hens of some breeds can produce over 300 eggs per year; the highest authenticated rate of egg laying is 371 eggs in 364 days. [85] After 12 months of laying, the commercial hen's egg-laying ability declines to the point where ...
Forced molting typically involves the removal of food and/or water from poultry for an extended period of time to reinvigorate egg-laying. Forced molting, sometimes known as induced molting, is the practice by some poultry industries of artificially provoking a flock to molt simultaneously, typically by withdrawing food for 7–14 days and sometimes also withdrawing water for an extended period.
Red shaver hens can lay from 305 to 315 eggs a year, [3] and are reported to be prolific producers of large brown eggs. One four-year-old Red Shaver chicken in Ottawa was credited with laying an egg with a mass of 143 grams, which is almost three times the size of a standard medium egg (Typically a medium egg is 49 g, a jumbo egg is 70 g).
Older hens gradually produce fewer eggs, and the eggs are usually larger. [1] Since the average lifespan of a pet layer hen is 8–15 years, [2] henopause has received attention as a potential problem for backyard or urban chicken farmers who are eventually faced with the decision to either slaughter older layers or keep them as non-producing pets.
With domestication, it has become more profitable to incubate eggs artificially, while keeping hens in full egg production. To help achieve this, there has been intense artificial selection for non-broodiness in commercial egg laying chickens and parent stock of poultry. As a result of this artificial selection, broodiness has been reduced to ...
The common cuckoo brood parasite removing the reed warbler eggs from their own nest. Egg tossing or egg destruction is a behavior observed in some species of birds where one individual removes an egg from the communal nest. [1] This is related to infanticide, where parents kill their own or other's offspring. [2]