Taken from Free-range Poultry

by Katie Thear, http://www.blpbooks.co.uk
Publishers of Poultry and Smallholding Books
First published in 1990 by Farming press books.

Day length has an important bearing on the egg laying cycle. Once the day begins to get shorter, the number of eggs is gradually reduced until laying may cease altogether. In the wild, eggs are laid in several batches during the increasing light periods of spring to summer, with the reproductive cycle being confined to that period.

Although the domestic hen has been bred to produce eggs over a much longer period than her wild ancestors, she requires extra light if eggs are to be guaranteed through the winter. The provision of light needs to be seen in two ways - day length and light intensity. Both these aspects play an important role and it is necessary to be able to distinguish between them. Day length is, quite simply, the number of hours in which light is available. The longest day is 21 June, when the natural day length is 17 hours. As this maximum declines, from July onwards, artificial light must be made available so that birds, which are in lay, do not have their day length shortened.

Lighting can be provided in one of several ways, depending upon the size of the house; 40-watt tungsten bulbs or 6-8 watt fluorescent bulbs or tubes are satisfactory, with the light sources placed 10 meters apart. One light source is sufficient for up to 100 birds. On a small scale, an ordinary 25-watt bulb is satisfactory, while a portable system based on a 12-volt car bulb and battery suffices where mains electricity is not available.

There are two golden rules with lighting. Do not provide light too early, before point of lay pullets have grown adequately, otherwise they will lay small eggs. The second rule is not to allow the day length to shorten once the birds are laying. Free-range birds must be adequately grown before they can cope with the demands of outdoor ranging as well as egg laying. If growers are approaching the point of lay in spring, there is usually no need to give them artificial light at all.

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