More Winter Light

Winter often brings shorter days—and fewer eggs. But is adding artificial light really the answer?

In this video, we'll separate fact from fiction and discuss what supplemental lighting can and cannot do for your flock.

We'll cover:
• Why egg production naturally declines during winter.
• How day length affects a hen's laying cycle.
• When supplemental lighting may be helpful.
• Common mistakes poultry keepers make with winter lighting.
• Why lighting alone won't solve every egg production problem.

By the end of this video, you'll understand what actually works, what doesn't, and how to make better winter management decisions for your flock.

Helping Poultry Keepers Make Better Decisions.

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Transcript

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SPEAKER_04 0:23

All about supplemental lighting. Jeff, I'm going to bounce it to you because I know you deal with folks that want supplemental lighting and folks that really don't care about supplemental lighting. What are your thoughts?

SPEAKER_01 0:41

To me, it really depends on when you want your eggs for whatever purpose, hatching, eating, otherwise, right? And the age of your flock. So they're going to naturally stimulate in the spring of the year, you know, starting in March, rolling through April, as the days get longer, they will naturally stimulate. So if you have your birds at the right age and body condition when the days get longer, about March 15th, then you can let them naturally stimulate and they're on a perfect cycle.

SPEAKER_02 1:45

Does adding artificial light shorten their lifespan?

SPEAKER_01 1:50

It doesn't. And free choice feed, things like that. I've got plenty of people doing breeding with seven plus-year-old hens, and they're doing fine. Yeah, we can, you know, we can keep them rocking and rolling for a long time. Some over 10 now. You know, we've got some hens at 10, 11, and 12. Wow. They don't give you many eggs. Granted, they don't, you don't, you might get one clutch of eggs out of them, right? But when you have that special hand, yeah, then you know that one clutch is great, right? You're happy for it.

SPEAKER_04 3:09

I had hands that I was grateful for whatever number of eggs I got from them that year. Yeah. Whether it was one or a hundred. Yeah. But uh to me it was worth it. Let's talk let's talk about what light actually does for our birds. Why it basically why does it work? Jeff, what what's your thoughts on it?

SPEAKER_01 3:42

So light is a natural occurrence, right? In nature, you know, hands should start laying. What happens is light stimulates, I believe it's the thymus gland in their brain and stimulates them to start ovulating and laying eggs. So it's a completely natural cycle in nature to do this. So it's just you know, it's part of their system, and you know, we can either do it, let nature run its course, which is how Sue does it right now, and that's fine. Okay, you you have to choose you know what your goals and ambitions are for your flock. You know, when do you want to hatch? When do you want to mate? When do you want chicks, things like that, right? Or you're gonna get mating in the spring, you know, hatching in the spring, and you're gonna get what you get, right? And a lot of people are comfortable with that, and I'm not saying that's right or wrong, I'm saying it's up to you to figure out what you need for your system.

SPEAKER_04 4:55

Jeff, does it make any difference as to the color of the light that you use?

SPEAKER_01 5:02

It does, and and Carrie did quite a bit of read deep dive into this. So when they're growing from chick up to maturity, you want more of the blue-green end of the spectrum, light spectrum, and then for egg production, you switch over to more of the yellow-orange end of the spectrum to stimulate egg production.

SPEAKER_02 5:27

That's interesting.

SPEAKER_04 5:30

Reason I ask, I had somebody ask me just the other day, well, can I use red lights? And I said, I don't think that works too well for that. No, it's very good.

SPEAKER_01 5:44

But even for the laying hens, like the typical heat lamp is not the right spectrum. There's not enough orange in there.

SPEAKER_00 5:52

So yeah, it's too much red, it needs to be more orange. Almost like it is outside right now.

SPEAKER_04 6:03

Carrie, I also had a conversation oh about a month or so ago. I I I can't remember exactly. But somebody was basically equating the extra light to the health of the chicken. Got any thoughts on that?

SPEAKER_00 6:27

Well, I mean, a lot of people say, Oh, well, if you like your birds like that, you know, it's not healthy for them, they'll die sooner, etc. etc. etc. But from my experience, I have a hen, two of them, one is 10 years old and one is 12. And they have given me, they have hen hatched as recently as this past summer, and they are on the same light cycle as all of my birds are that are in my breeding yard. And what I usually do is once I see the molt first happen, cut the lights off, and I let you know, I do what I need to do to hurry the molt up, get them back feathering as quick as possible, get them to wait if they do get obese, you know, to make that quick and painless, because I mean it's miserable hot, they're losing feathers, and you know, so I try to make that as quick and painless as possible, and then I'll wait until September-ish, you know, let them get fully feathered again, and then I just you know check and see what time the sun comes up, and I'll go, I'll set my timers for that, and then the following week I'll set it back 30 minutes, and then back 30 minutes, and I'll do that every week until it'll they come on at three o'clock in the morning. That's real important to to time that out just 30 minutes every week, and not it provides studies show that it provides the least amount of stress for the birds by stretching it out like that, and also it makes it a gradual process so you don't mess with the health or anything like that of the bird, and doing it in the morning time, essentially stretching the day by starting in the morning. You know, I cut my lights off at three o'clock in the afternoon. That allows for them to have the natural eating, roosting, all that stuff chickens do in the evening. And you know, sometimes the the timers will get off because we have a power outage or something like that, and they'll start crowing at 10 o'clock at night. I'm like, what the crap. But you know, we'll we'll get that fixed. But that's what I found works best on my yard, and I found that from about two years worth of testing based off a lot of the research that I did. That's one of the reasons why I know using an orangeish red light in the brooder. If you stack it tight, you'll wind up with aggressive birds that will want to pick. Using a blue light, and just you know, if you got to use a heat lamp, use one of the ceramic emitters that screw in instead of the actual light bulb, and you can use a a blue light, very low. I think the ones that I have are equivalent to like 10 watts. They're, I mean, they're well, y'all can't see that, but they're about as big around as a half dollar.

SPEAKER_04 10:14

Those little short stubby things.

SPEAKER_00 10:16

Yeah, when I screw them in, they probably stick out an inch above the socket, but it gives them enough light, it's not too bright, and the the bluish colors, the bluish part of the spectrum really promotes the growth.

SPEAKER_04 10:34

Sue, I had a conversation with a fellow here a couple of days ago, and I think you'd you'll find it interesting because it goes back to what you were saying that it's important to make that light change gradually.

SPEAKER_02 10:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 10:53

And he said, Oh, no, no, I don't do that. I I just boom, I cook, I go from how many hours he's getting to to 16 hours. I said, I know and and he said, Well, I I do it. I said, Let me ask you a question. I said, What do you think about daylight savings time? He said, Well, I don't like it. I just looked, I just can't adjust to that overnight. I said, Neither can your chickens. You can't, but you're making your chickens, right? And he and no pun intended, but I think the light came on.

SPEAKER_00 11:34

You know, when I found when a lot of people ask me questions, and I like I had one yesterday, a guy had made a feed change and was having some very adverse effects. And you know, he was like, I don't get it. And I said, Well, think of this. What happens when you give a baby too much of this? And he said, Well, they'll get stopped up and it can cause problems.

SPEAKER_02 12:01

I said, There you go.

SPEAKER_00 12:05

I know one's a mammal and one's not, but that gastrointestinal thing is very similar. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_04 12:19

Jeff, and I've heard you talk about this a couple of times, but I think people would be surprised to hear this, but I'd like for you to speak to how much light is really necessary to get the job done.

SPEAKER_01 12:35

Very little.

SPEAKER_04 12:36

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 12:38

And I wish people would get some sort of light meter, whether they get a free, you know, downloadable, which we've talked about before, you know, LUX Lux. It's a free download, you know, use that. So between 40 and 60 lux is all you want. Okay. You need 40 to stimulate. You really don't want to go over 60, otherwise, you start causing aggressive behavior, like rip or like Carrie was talking about, you know, a little bit ago. And so people go at this with, you know, they think, well, if a little bit's good, a lot's better, and they put a hundred watt bulb in there, yeah. And then they wonder why their chickens are freaking out and killing each other. And right, and so no, they're not, they do not like bright, intense light. And so, like Carrie was saying, he was using like a 10 or 15 watt bulb. My standard rule of thumb is a 25-watt bulb for a 10 by 10 foot by 10 foot chicken coop, right? So if you got them in a 10 foot by 10 foot building, one 25-watt equivalent bulb, right, is all it takes, right? So, you know, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:00

And like that light that I'm using, I'm using it in a brooder that's two foot wide and eight foot long, and it's in the middle.

SPEAKER_01 14:09

So it doesn't have the lowest wattage I could find.

SPEAKER_04 14:12

And the folks, the other side of that coin is those lower wattage bulbs save you a little bit of money on your electrical electrical bill.

SPEAKER_01 14:23

Yeah, yeah. We do have a question in the gallery if you got time.

unknown 14:28

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 14:29

Whenever it fits in, you just tell me whenever fits in. All right. So, Chris, Chris Heitz Heitzman, I think he's in Alaska, but he said, somewhat related to tonight's subject, I remember hearing someone say that having more hours of dark would stimulate more weight gain in a meatbird. Actually, Chris, that's counterintuitive. So we actually find with the meatbirds, you know, them being on up to 16 hours of light is actually a good thing. It's more eating time. So 16 on, eight off is a really good time. The commercial industry has gone to four on, two off, four on, two off, four on two off, four on two off, right? So they have four hours of light, two hours of rest, four hours of light, two hours of rest, and they're getting more increased weight gain with that lighting schedule.

SPEAKER_00 15:29

Faster too, probably.

SPEAKER_01 15:30

Yeah, but it is stressful on the chicken to do that. Now they don't care about stress on their chicken, so that's what they're doing it for pure profit. But no, even my Cornish Crossgrower people down here, you know, those longer days, you know, help a lot in gaining weight. Now, if you're talking about pure fat for flavor purposes, then feeding them heavy before they go to the to the perch, to the roost, you're going to increase your body fat percentage, but not necessarily overall growth.

SPEAKER_00 16:11

You'll get more liquid gold out of it. Yeah, exactly. You want the broth. Right. But you're gonna have some chunky chicken.

SPEAKER_02 16:19

I'll have to remember that next time I raise some of those things.

SPEAKER_00 16:24

And at night. Yeah, Sue's like, Whoa, did you say more broth? Look, Sue's gonna she's gonna hatch out some some reds are next year, and she right out of the hatcher, she'll be like, I'm gonna paint that one's leg, that one. She'll get her about six or eight of them, and she's gonna paint her feet pink, and she's gonna just pour the feed to them, and they're gonna get eight to ten pounds, and she's gonna have God only knows how many mason jars of liquid gold.

SPEAKER_03 17:02

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:04

I mean, then I'll be swap making swaps, then she'll send me some broth. I'll send her some non-GMO corn so she can have cornbread.

SPEAKER_02 17:13

There we go. Yep. And I'm taking my ducks ducks to the processor, and then I'm gonna get me some duck fat. That's good stuff.

SPEAKER_00 17:26

Yes, it is. You can give that to those reds next year.

SPEAKER_02 17:31

And no, no, they might get fried in it.

SPEAKER_04 17:36

There you go. And before we move on, folks, I just want to say that you need to think of lighting is one management tool that you can use. It's it's not a miracle solution. Okay, it's not gonna re overcome bad feed or bad genetics.

SPEAKER_01 17:59

No, but it's part of the overall and it's part of overall management. Exactly. Yeah. But um if Sue actually does that and and shows, you know, figures out her calls that early out of the out of the brooder, we should have a different feed for them. Yeah, you know, as a meat bird.

SPEAKER_00 18:23

Say I got one I can send you. Shave two to three weeks off. I had a I had a a customer that I talked to today who is livid because this year um they're good, they're not going to use the same feed that they used last year. And he showed them the numbers, he showed them the math, and he's like, they they still won't do it. And I said, Well, I mean, he said, That's gonna be three more weeks of work. I said, Well, they probably look at it by like you get paid by the hour regardless. He said, That's got me. I'm not happy with that. Um it's a thing.

SPEAKER_04 19:16

Definitely so let's talk about supplemental light and breeding. Carrie, what's your thoughts on that?

SPEAKER_00 19:28

So I am very pro winter hatching. Now, you know, Rip, for us winter, yeah, you know, we might see in the teens less than a week. We might see below 30 two to three weeks, and that's it. So I have a heated barn. Down here, I was gonna say you don't see teens at all. Yeah, but I've seen it down to 12 here. Oh once in your life. Well, but that was a long time ago. Um, but I like doing that because you know, my barn is heated, it is not it ain't cooled very well. I'll say that. It it gets pretty hot in there, even with the fans and stuff go in in the summertime. So it's really easy to brood in there in the winter time. And you know, I I still put chicks on the ground at three to four weeks old when they're fully feathered, and unless it's below 30 outside. If it's below 30, then I'll wait till they're five weeks. But when they're fully feathered, like these, about like the ones in my background, I'm gonna put them out. And the first time or two I did that, didn't work out great. But the ones that it did work out great with next year, did it again and had even less problems. And doing stuff like that is one of the ways that I've been able to increase my hybrid vigor on my birds because you know, I mean, a breeder is only as good as the birds he breeds, and you know, I I can I can say without doubt that I could take chicks from my house, ship them to Sioux, and they would live perfectly fine eating the scraps that her ducks leave behind because they have a strong hybrid veer. I've had people try to chastise me for putting them out that young, but I'm like, I mean, I'm not putting them in the front yard, they have a doghouse to get in. To with no wind. Like there's hay in there so they can stay warm. It's not like I'm you know throwing them out in a wild blue.

SPEAKER_01 22:09

So, but you know, I like it, it works. So, Carrie, since you brought this up, okay, we were talking before you came on the show, and how how soon are your reds fully feathered?

SPEAKER_00 22:29

The males usually three-ish weeks, maybe four.

SPEAKER_02 22:36

The males?

SPEAKER_00 22:37

Depending on whether or not I'm slipping. Well, I mean, Sue, you gotta you gotta I mean I know you're great with your feed program, yeah, but Jeff designed mine.

SPEAKER_02 22:50

Gotcha.

SPEAKER_01 22:52

We volunteered you to send some of the perfect starter feed to Sue so she can run a side-by-side trial with what she's doing. Okay. So next January.

SPEAKER_00 23:06

So you gotta take her big V starter and do do the hocus pocus that she does. Right. And then she'll take perfect chick starter beside it, and she'll weigh up like once a week for the first month or two.

SPEAKER_02 23:22

And I can do that.

unknown 23:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:25

She'll give you trackable data because before you came on, she said it's like five or six weeks before her males know her longer.

SPEAKER_00 23:32

Sometimes I mean the do the males do take an extra week for me. Yeah, but yeah, it starts happening pretty fast.

SPEAKER_04 23:41

But yeah, I I never had my mind perform very much like Sue. Yeah, the males are always behind the females on feathering.

SPEAKER_01 23:50

Always stay tuned for the experiment next spring. That's right. Yeah, you can be continued. Somebody's gonna let somebody's gonna learn something new, right? Stay tuned.

SPEAKER_02 24:02

That would be me.

SPEAKER_00 24:02

I'll say, I'll say this. Jennifer was very skeptical, like I was in the beginning. And I told her, I gave her a bag, and I said, just try. And you know, she she plays with quail because you can see your science project results a lot faster with them because they mature in eight weeks. Yeah, and now ShowPro feeds everything she has except for her free-range ducks, and they mostly feed themselves.

SPEAKER_04 24:42

Yeah, so Jeff, get getting back to light and breeders. How soon should you start extending the light on your breeder birds before you want to start setting eggs?

SPEAKER_01 25:03

Okay, yeah, I'm glad you said it that way. I would not keep eggs for hatching until you've reached 14 hours of light coming up gradually, okay?

SPEAKER_03 25:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:17

Or, and that should be the same time when you hit the appropriate egg size of roughly 55 grams. Right. So, you know, egg size is just as important in this whole scenario. But as you've mentioned many times on the show, and to us privately, right, it's just as important for the males to get that light stimulation, right? And actually your older males need a little bit more than your cockerels do to trigger that testosterone and be fully functional.

SPEAKER_00 25:56

So if you're one of those breeders that you know, you you put your male birds over in rooster camp during the winter time, so they leave the hens alone. And you know, I would start stretching my day out about two to three weeks sooner at rooster camp than I would for my ladies.

SPEAKER_01 26:21

All right, it depends on it depends on the age of your roosters, too, because cockerels, you know, first year mating cockerels have no issues whatsoever. Right. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 26:31

They they're ready to think they're like a teenager, yes.

SPEAKER_01 26:34

But you know, your four-year-old, five-year-old males, okay, they need a little bit of coffee to wake them up. They need some, they need that light stimulation to prep them, right, and get them ready. So and you talked about separation, and separation is people don't listen to me, but it's absolutely critical for excellent mating to have your roosters and your hens separate for about 45 to 60 days prior to mating season.

SPEAKER_00 27:07

Makes a difference. You know, they gotta they gotta have time to to build up.

SPEAKER_01 27:12

Well, they gotta have time to get lonely.

SPEAKER_03 27:14

Yeah, that too.

SPEAKER_00 27:16

And you know, for me, even even dear and like I've got some brood pens that have six, seven hens in them that actually get along, which you know that's a different story. But I'll set the male, and this really drives my wife nuts, or it used to. She's actually helps feed the bird now. But I'll set those 39 by 39 stag pins in the yard, and I'll put the rooster in that with shade, and I'll keep them separate from the hens for a few days, then I'll go toss them back in there. Like a teenager all over again. Because he's been able to hear them, he knows they're there, but he can't even see them.

SPEAKER_04 28:09

I I don't know how many people I've had come to me and say, My male is not fertile. What supplement do I need to give him? Or I've tried this supplement and that supplement and this hoodoo juice and two or three other things. Doesn't work. Said if you tried giving them extra light, yeah. Does that make a difference?

SPEAKER_00 28:34

Makes a big difference. Yeah, it either needs to go on a diet or it needs some more light.

SPEAKER_02 28:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 28:41

Well, most of the time.

SPEAKER_02 28:43

Or both.

SPEAKER_03 28:45

Or both, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 28:46

Yeah. A molt show is a completely different topic, but yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:50

So that's interesting. That would that would have helped me this last breeding season with my older birds, because I got very limited chicks out of them.

SPEAKER_01 29:04

So make sure you mold them good.

SPEAKER_02 29:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:09

You separate them though, right, Sue? You do do separate the males from the females?

SPEAKER_02 29:14

Sometimes. Okay. That's another thing I need to do too.

SPEAKER_01 29:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 29:20

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 29:22

Bachelor a bachelor pad would be good.

SPEAKER_02 29:25

Yeah, he's he's gonna move in with the young boys. Get them settled down.

SPEAKER_01 29:30

Good.

SPEAKER_02 29:31

Yep. Yep.

SPEAKER_04 29:33

Hey, before we go any further, I need to do a little commercial here. Stand by. We would like to take a short break to express our appreciation to the Frell Company for their sponsorship of the Poultry Keepers 360 Live programming. For Trail has been a trusted name in sustainable farming and poultry nutrition for decades, and their commitment to providing high-quality, natural products aligns perfectly with the values we hold there in our poultry community. Thank you, Frutrail, for partnering with us to empower poultry keepers everywhere. We're truly grateful for your dedication and support. And amen to that. We could not do this without for trail's contribution. We really appreciate it. You know, you say for decades.

SPEAKER_00 30:36

It's actually been eight of them this year. Well, that's decades.

SPEAKER_04 30:42

That's pretty pretty awesome. I I got a question for Jeff on that. Sir, I always thought of for trail as plant products, fertilizers, and that sort of thing. But has it always been plant and livestock, or did they kind of come?

SPEAKER_01 31:07

No, it it started out. Okay, I'm gonna give you the five-minute history. Go for it. So it actually started out in 1946 from a man's love of roses, rose plants. So right up your alley, Rip. You know, he was all about the flowers. And at the time of the Industrial Revolution and the way fertilizers were going, he wasn't happy with the bloom quality, he wasn't happy with the aroma, and he wasn't happy at how long the bloom would stay fresh looking, like when he cut it. And so he started mixing and matching, you know, natural inputs in his garage till he got what he wanted, and that was the birth of Fertrell. Now, animal products came about in around 1974, when we branched into we had a good line of fertilizer, and then we we branched into animal nutrition in 74. I wasn't there then. I came along around the first time was 81, 82, 83, and then back in 95 when I come back out of the Air Force.

SPEAKER_04 32:14

So appreciate you sharing that because I have often wondered, but and I'm glad y'all made it made the decision to do it.

SPEAKER_01 32:27

Our roots are in fertilizer and agronomy.

SPEAKER_00 32:32

The humble part of Jeff gave the very high 50,000-foot view of that story. But if you go to their website and you look on there where they have their catalog, that's the story is printed in their catalog, and it's actually a pretty amazing story about how the company began. It is where they were, what they were looking for. And crazy enough, I read it every time I get a catalog because I like the story.

SPEAKER_01 33:07

Yep. Yeah, we have a good story.

SPEAKER_04 33:12

No doubt about that. Okay, let's switch to things poultry keepers should consider if they're thinking about supplemental lighting. What about the age of the birds? Can that have an impact?

SPEAKER_01 33:35

A little. It's not so much age, it's the level of maturity of the pullet of when you start lighting. And this is hard to translate, but I'm gonna do my best. Is you do not want to stimulate a cockerel or a pullet until she is at least 80% of what her mature weight should be. So if you weighed your three-year-old hen, all right, and use that as your reference, I do not want to stimulate a pullet to start laying until she's at a minimum of 80%. Okay. All right, and if you do, if you stimulate them too early, and a lot of people do because they're excited to get their first egg, all right, you're gonna fight immature small eggs, underweight eggs for a long, long, long time. If you will wait until that bird is above 80% of its fully matured weight, you will not have as many pullet or peewee eggs, and you will get into hatching size eggs sooner. Okay, but everybody's in a hurry. And so that being said, you know, for for most of the folks here using standard bread, I would say you don't want that light stimulation before six months old on average. Some are a little earlier, some are a little later, right? But so now I'm also saying, if you read between the lines, at six months old, if you've done a good job as a poultry keeper, that should be everything. Some of the extremely heavy breeds probably not, but yeah.

SPEAKER_04 35:55

We we lost a a good bit of that because the audio was cutting out, but that's all right. Does the time of the year a female is hatched have an impact on whether they would need supplemental lighting or not?

SPEAKER_01 36:17

I mean, your spring hatch birds, if you're hatching in March, should be old enough and mature enough to actually start lighting in October or November to again if if she's 80% of her mature weight. Okay. It's not age. I'd I'd just soon rip just throw age right out the window. It is it is development stage, body weight development stage is more critical because her ovaries have not fully formed if she doesn't reach that body weight target before starting to lick.

SPEAKER_04 37:01

That makes sense. Makes perfect sense.

SPEAKER_00 37:04

You know, it's more about the weight. You know, it's not about the age as to whether or not they're grown or mature.

SPEAKER_03 37:14

Right.

SPEAKER_00 37:15

It's about what else, everything else is going on.

SPEAKER_04 37:24

What about molting hens? Could you use lighting to bring them out of a molt faster?

SPEAKER_01 37:33

Yep, absolutely. And people don't actually understand that reducing light to below eleven hours down into that 10 hour range helps to actually stimulate the mold and get them feathers off faster. Right. So if you want to be a little bit more in control of your mold, you you keep them locked up a little bit longer so they don't see daylight. And keep that that light window under 10 hours, or at 10 hours, they'll molt faster. So light is a significant part of the mold. And then once the once you've achieved your goals of the molt, then you want to re-stimulate them just like you did before, coming up gradually out of the molt, okay, with your lighting to stimulate them back into light.

SPEAKER_00 38:33

Give them more protein, right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:41

After after the mold.

SPEAKER_00 38:43

After sorry, I I couldn't resist.

SPEAKER_04 39:06

I mean, is it better to extend production by using supplemental lighting than allowing your birds to take a natural rest when as the day shorten?

SPEAKER_01 39:26

So each breed's a little bit different because of how many eggs we expect them to lay, right? A good Rhode Island red, I would assume right around 250 eggs laid in a year. So, you know, you're looking at 10 months of lay, and she should have a couple months off. Right? That's that would be the natural. Now, some breeds, you know, a lot of the game fowl breeds, they're not gonna lay that many eggs. You're looking at 100 to 120 eggs, is kind of your expected range. So each breed's gonna be slightly different. I think it's important to know what that is, and I don't know where that date is at, but you know, but your barred rocks, your your Rhode Island Reds, your Buff Arpingtons, etc., had been bred not only for dual purpose reasons, but to be a prolific egg layer, right? Where you're getting 200 eggs a year. So I think that's kind of your target mark. And then, you know, I I would so you're looking at 220, 250 days out of the year, giving them roughly three months off, four months off, you know, where I wouldn't expect them to lay. If if that does it, does that help answer your question at all? Yes, yes, okay. But I I think that's gonna be very breed specific, and you can't expect, you know, so a lot of breeders and I end, you know, that I end up talking to have this breed, that breed, like they've got 10 different breeds in their barn, and their light or their egg expectations are not the same. So some of those birds are gonna go too long, or some of those birds are not going to lay enough for that egg cycle. So somebody's gonna get hurt one way or the other. So the Krebs, how many eggs?

SPEAKER_02 41:25

What what's their expectation to oh they're they're probably 200, 250. Okay, so they're they actually that's uh one of the things that I've focused on with the reds is trying to get their egg production up because my Krebs outlay the reds. Yeah, they should at least be even, if not the reds be ahead of them, but right.

SPEAKER_01 41:51

Red a red is assumed to be a 250 egg a year bird, right? On the first lay cycle, then you gradually decline over time, probably 200, 180 to 200 on the second, etc. etc.

SPEAKER_00 42:04

But yeah, um I would love for mine to lay 250 eggs a year.

SPEAKER_01 42:11

Well, you have to start breeding for that too. So you have to watch your your biggest your best egg layers. And actually that's easier to determine than most people think. If they'll actually do the pelvic bone inspection, like slipping fingers between the pelvic bone, your best layers will have the biggest space gap between those pelvic bones, you know, at the end of the season.

SPEAKER_02 42:35

That's that's a really important thing that that every breeder should learn how to do is put their hands on their birds and learn to fill that space.

SPEAKER_04 42:46

And and we do have a video on that on our YouTube channel, by the way. Yeah, something that Munro Babcock told me once. He said, another thing we we were talking about the pelvic measurements and all that. He said, Yeah, and he said, There's another trick that you can use. He said, Don't set an egg that is laid after about 9:30 or 10 o'clock in the morning. He said, if you set those early laid eggs, you'll get much better production increase in your flock.

SPEAKER_02 43:29

Well, Danny Feathers said that too.

SPEAKER_01 43:36

Yeah, I believe there's a lot of truth to that. Yeah, you know, but doing those body depth measurements that you've talked about, Rip, like you know, uh a big broad flat back, you know, the measurement from the end of the keel bone to the pelvic to the vent, those sort of things, those all add up, right? They're they're all part of the checklist.

SPEAKER_04 43:56

And and that whole it works for a Layers or it works for meatbirds because what you're what you're looking at and and selecting for is body capacity. And body capacity, good body capacity, has a really positive effect on layers and a really positive effect on meatbirds. Birds that are scrawny and have poor body capacity, they're not going to be doing good at either one of them. It's just a fact of life. And like I said, if you want to learn more about it, we do have a video uh on our YouTube channel that will explain how to do that. And it's it's not hard, it's not hard at all. What questions, guys, should somebody ask before they install lights if they want to start lighting their birds?

SPEAKER_01 45:04

Wow, that's that's a really deep question, Rip. Um that's that's a really deep question. Okay, so like square foot of the coop, right? What is what is the total square footage of the coop so that you make sure you get the right light? Like Gary was using what'd you say a 15-watt bulb or a 10-watt bulb?

SPEAKER_00 45:26

10. Ideally, you would take the square footage and divide by four and find a bulb as close to that wattage as possible. Right.

SPEAKER_01 45:35

Like my my measurement was a 10-foot by 10-foot coupe. You know, I'm using a 25-watt bulb. Okay. You know, Carrie was using a 10-watt bulb. And so not over stimulating the birds, making sure you have the right light. Your light needs to be put in in a location that uniformly lights the area, right? So there's no dark corners, all the birds get the same amount of light. But what question should a grower ask? Is that is that your question, Rip?

SPEAKER_04 46:12

Or should anybody ask? Okay. For example, is it better to use incandescent lighting, fluorescent lighting, or or some of this newer lighting that's come out?

SPEAKER_01 46:26

Yeah, incandescents are really hard to get. Um, high-end LEDs are probably your best bet with a lower flicker rate and or lower refresh rate. You need to read the label on the on the light bulb that you purchase. And the refresh rate, while the human eye doesn't detect it, a poultry's eye is much more sensitive. Chicken's eye is much more sensitive. So the refresh rate or how often a pulse is sent to the light to regenerate it, a chicken's eye can pick up on. And if if it's too slow or there's too much light intensity variation between pulses, you'll drive them nuts, right? You'll you'll make them insane. It affects them very mentally.

SPEAKER_00 47:17

It'd be like you going and sitting at a party with a strobe light on.

SPEAKER_03 47:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 47:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 47:24

I uh I don't know if I still got the study or not, but uh when I was in the Bronze Club, one of our members did a study on incandescent versus fluorescent lights, and some of the data he had was just amazing. I mean, that the fluorescent lights just drove the birds bonkers.

SPEAKER_01 47:47

Yeah. Incandescents, if we could still get them a true incandescent bulb, are excellent, right? They don't have a noticeable flicker rate or refresh rate, whereas, you know, even the human eye can pick up on the fluorescent recharger.

SPEAKER_00 48:04

Yeah, some of them. I tell people I tell people to take their cell phone and put the bring the camera up and look at it. And when you do that, if you see it like this, that's how the bird sees it. Yeah. Wow. And you know, people, I I also tell people, you know, when you go to the beach, do you wear sunglasses or do you go out there in the middle of the day and just look around at everything? And you know, most people wear sunglasses or have a hat to shade their face. It's the same deal with because it it drives you crazy. It's the same deal with chickens. If they have too much light, it's gonna drive them crazy. So if you want the best results, whether it be for growing, breeding, whatever, you need to eliminate as much stress as possible.

SPEAKER_04 49:07

What about lighting situations? And K I know you've done a lot of research into this, but the actual installation of the lights, particularly hardwired versus solar systems. Is there any difference in those?

SPEAKER_00 49:25

Well, if it's done correctly, no, but the biggest difference is most people that want to put together a solar system are gonna go down to Harbor Freight and they're gonna buy their stuff. Now, I'm not knocking Harbor Freight, I'm a track club member, but when you go there and you get your solar panels and you get your batteries and you get your lights, the lights will probably give you a headache when you turn them on. So I think there's there's a guy that Jeff knows, and I've talked to him once or twice too, that makes a complete system, and it's like five, six hundred bucks. High quality, perfect for poultry, designed for poultry. And also, I have some that are designed that work off batteries. You can get them to work off Milwaukee, DeWalt, Makita, whatever, and they're specifically designed for poultry. But the most important part is gonna be the bulb. You know, the the solar panels, the cheaper solar panels don't light them up as much, so they don't stay out there. And once you start lighting birds, you need it to be consistent. Because bird birds are like old people, they like consistency, they don't like nothing changing, and if you screw with it, you're gonna be like, You peg me pretty good, you know that, don't you? Or make them mad.

SPEAKER_02 51:19

Me too.

SPEAKER_00 51:20

Well, I'm the same way, you know. I I say that because I'm the same way, and I I mean I'm not as old as y'all, but all my life I've been told I have an old soul, and it's because I was practically raised by my granddaddy, and that kind of stuff gets on my nerves, that kind of stuff gets on chickens' nerves too. But Sydney, he put the information in there.

SPEAKER_01 51:44

That guy, great systems, AlumaCoupe now has a light up for the smaller coops as well.

SPEAKER_00 51:52

Yeah, we have a a single unit all the way up to well, we're fixing to release another model that will do wireless and control lights a little over a mile away from each other.

SPEAKER_02 52:10

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 52:11

So now I don't know what a LumaCoupe's single unit cost is. Do you know? Sydney's Sydney's system includes the solar panel, the timer, all the controls, and the LED light, the proper LED light, high-end. If you buy the battery locally, the deep cycle battery, it's around 500 bucks. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 52:38

Yeah, this one saves you a lot of money because of freight.

SPEAKER_01 52:42

Right. And then you like said you get your own battery, you know, Walmart, wherever you buy your deep cycle batteries. And so, but you know, his are being used, you know, outdoor mobile chicken coops that have no way of getting electric to them. And they've been doing this for 10 or 12 years. So he's got this system really debugged and balanced out and you know, basically foolproof.

SPEAKER_00 53:14

Yeah. So the one that we have, the one that does not use solar, it just uses the DeWalt, Milwaukee, or Makita batteries that you have to swap out every two, three days. They're about shipped in the lower 48, it's gonna run you about 150 and some change.

SPEAKER_01 53:37

Right. So it'd be a lower cost investment.

SPEAKER_00 53:40

Yeah, yeah. And that's good for at least a 10 by 12 coupe.

SPEAKER_01 53:45

Right. And it's got the right spectrum LED in it. Both of them do, right? So both systems work. But if you're running a larger barn, you know, Sydney's is gonna be more, you know, if if you've got a 20 by 40 barn and you want to run three lights in there, right? Sydney's system can do that.

SPEAKER_03 54:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 54:08

Whereas the Illumacou, not so much. You're gonna need two or three of them. Probably three.

SPEAKER_00 54:14

Until we release the AK 400. Yeah. When the AK 400's released, uh, I know for a fact that one unit will eat at least control 50 remotes.

SPEAKER_02 54:27

Wow.

SPEAKER_04 54:35

Here's another question that I had asked, and I said, I don't know, but I'll bring it up Thursday night. Is there ever a situation where allowing nature to take its course may be the better choice than supplemental lighting? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 54:58

I think that's a personal preference.

SPEAKER_00 55:02

I think it's a personal preference. Yeah, and it's hard to find like you told me way back when it all depends on your goals. Yeah. You know, if if you're one of those people that got chickens because you wanted to save money on eggs, or because you didn't want recently because you didn't want to get anything from eating eggs, then you probably are gonna want to supplement light because that'll keep them laying the most. Yeah. If you I don't know, there's all kinds of variables.

SPEAKER_01 55:44

If you want to be a fall, if you're gonna fall hatch like you did, Rip, you don't you almost have to, yeah. Right?

SPEAKER_02 55:50

Yeah, keep them laying.

SPEAKER_01 55:52

Right. So again, outline your goals, outline your purpose, and then go from there. This show is not about right or wrong, it's about if you're gonna do it, do it right. Right?

SPEAKER_00 56:06

Yeah, but is it your farm, your rules? Yeah, you know, you but you to properly answer the question, R, you have to start with whatever the goals are. Because different things work.

SPEAKER_01 56:27

I I love the debate that goes on out there, you know, in our groups like Poultry Keeper 360, Poultry Reader Nutrition, you know, when the lighting subject comes on. I just let them do it naturally so they live longer. Yeah, well, that's a bunch of horse bucky, so especially if you have raccoons. And so the lights are not what's killing your chickens, and it's not gonna make them live longer or not live longer. Okay, it it is not the stress factor, okay. It it it's a lot of other things, but that is they need a healthy body.

SPEAKER_04 57:05

I mean to me it's sure it's hard to convince them of that though, sometimes especially those reds.

SPEAKER_00 57:11

Every every aspect of a chicken's life, if you have good genetic birds, well, not just chickens, any kind of poultry, it's it's on the chicken tender. It's management.

SPEAKER_04 57:27

To to me, poultry keeping, good poultry keeping boils down to three main things genetics, nutrition, and management. That's my direct they're all it's all rooted in those three things.

SPEAKER_00 57:45

And chicken tender controls two of them. Yep. Now, if somebody has a chicken that goes to the feed store and picks out their bag, number one, I want to see a video of it, and number two, I I want one of them because I've never seen that. But it'd be interesting, wouldn't it? And I I tell people, I'm like, you know, this is your fault. Nobody likes to hear that, but yeah, I've never seen a chicken clean up their bedroom. No, I've never seen a chicken pick out their food, how often they're fed, or how much they're fed. And I've never seen a chicken change their water.

SPEAKER_02 58:33

Nope.

SPEAKER_00 58:34

I've seen them poop in it, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 58:37

And stand in it, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 58:40

And you know, standing in it on a hot day, I can get that. Yeah. Why they poop in it that that blows my mind.

SPEAKER_02 58:49

Ducks are the same thing.

SPEAKER_00 58:51

They oh ducks are probably worse.

SPEAKER_02 58:53

Oh, yes, yes, yep.

SPEAKER_01 58:56

If you're looking for all those intelligent factors you just outlined, you need a pig.

SPEAKER_03 59:01

Yeah, yes.

SPEAKER_01 59:04

Because they can their their sniffer is good enough to discern good feed over bad, right?

SPEAKER_00 59:10

And they're also master escape artists.

SPEAKER_01 59:13

It's the only other creature that I know that defecates in the same place every day.

SPEAKER_02 59:19

Yep, and will not lay in it, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 59:22

Right. No, like mine have a corner and they're pin. Yep, every single one of them goes there.

SPEAKER_02 59:32

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 59:33

That's the location.

SPEAKER_00 59:35

Every time it rains, half a bag of lime goes there.

SPEAKER_02 59:39

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 59:40

You still got pigs? I thought you were getting out of the pig business.

SPEAKER_02 59:44

He's got coony coonies.

SPEAKER_01 59:47

I thought he was getting out of the pig business.

SPEAKER_00 59:49

They serve a purpose, and I can only eat so much bacon.

SPEAKER_01 59:55

I didn't know there was a limit to bacon.

SPEAKER_04 59:57

I just started to say I didn't know there was such a thing.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:01

Either one of y'all eat more than a pound a day?

SPEAKER_02 1:00:03

No.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:04

I can get pretty close.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:08

The last one I put in the freezer, I put 200 pounds worth of meat in the freezer.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:16

Nice.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:19

Well, folks, we've come to the tail end of our show here. We're about out of time. Do you guys have anything else to share for the the good of the cause here to this evening?

SPEAKER_02 1:00:31

I'm gonna be setting up a light system this fall.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:34

Hot dog.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:36

Are you? Yeah, you want some help? At least on Ripolicious.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:43

I I can help you. I'd be glad to.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:46

I'm I'm gonna leave our our guest with this, and it's something we talk about a lot is observing your birds. Your better decisions are gonna come with better observations. So make sure that you're observing your birds. Learn what's normal. Because if you don't know what normal is, you're gonna think everything is abnormal and hit hit the panic button.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:13

So until we come back in two weeks, we hope you guys have a great two weeks. Enjoy your birds, enjoy yourselves, and have a good time.