I wonder why your hens are not laying, Deb? This is a good time of year for my chickens. I have nine laying right now (since one is broody) and usually get eight eggs a day. My EEs lay daily, and my orloffs often do as well despite being 2, and my RIR hens the same age do, as well, and my little cross that thinks she is the roo right now has her own color, so I can see she usually lays one a day as well.
I like it much better having different types of chickens so the color egg tells me who is laying. Much easier. I'll eventually have six or eight EEs so I hope my new ones lay a slightly different color.
I have let the chickens have the "dog yard" every day and they absolutely adore it. I really enjoy seeing the different colored beautiful chickens I have now, EEs rock! I tried to take some pics yesterday for y'all and I ran out of batteries. But they are so pretty and each different. It makes it really hard to sex them though. There was one I thought was turning out to be a roo, but yesterday I changed my mind, it is just a pretty little hen I think. But a different one is sure getting BIG green legs on her....er...him.....it. And the feathers are getting kinda pointy around the neck and it suddenly has a green tail feather as well, and it is the "partridge" colored one, one of the most colorful. It is quite a bit larger than the one that is a sexed cockerel, but if I went by that, I have all roos. The last time I bought sexed birds from this feed store, they were 100 percent the correct sex (18 of them!) so I know they are not all roos. But with other breeds, the comb and wattles seems to start forming and with my EEs, I don't see that the confirmed male looks any different than all the rest, nor is he larger. He does have the feather pattern, but he is a different color than all the rest so that doesn't really help.
Do we have any EE experts?