Roberta, you misunderstand how lighting affects laying, and also how the commercial operations work. Lighting does not "use up" hens. True, there are only a certain number of eggs available for the hen to lay throughout her lifetime. The lack of extended lighting will not stretch her egg laying life. There are other factors which reduce or eliminate laying in older hens long before all of the potential eggs are laid. Extended lighting merely allows her to lay more of those eggs earlier in her lifetime, before the other factors kick in and possibly end her laying career. Commercial operations do not "use up" hens in a year or two so that they no longer lay. They do use lighting and other more harmful practices to keep the hens in production for as much of that time period as possible. When they are done, they are sold as spent layers, but they are anything but. They merely begin to slow down in production where it becomes unprofitable for the large companies to continue to feed them versus the number of eggs that they are getting. These spent layers still lay plenty of eggs, and would lay well for the average backyard keepr for several more years, although not with quite an efficient feed to egg ratio, if you're looking at it only in dollars and cents. Rosedude, lighting in layers is a complex subject, and there are entire books written on it. There's a lot of info on the web. You should do a search. You don't say how long you've been doing it, but it doesn't work like magic. You don't turn the lights on one day and expect to get eggs the next. It takes up to several weeks for their systems to adjust. If they were in a molt when you began lighting, they might not start to lay until the molt is finished, no matter how much light you have on them. 13 hours is probably not enough. 16 is about average, but you can find more info on that in your searches. Sudden lengthening of daylight may also send them into a molt, if they have been getting normal daylength before that, so that will slow their laying also. Good luck.

Thanks Sue & Donna for posting follow ups after doing changes. I'm always yearning for more production earlier in the season because by mid August the sun lowers and my edible gardens receive less hours of sunlight from nearby tall fir trees. I've yet to have a soil test, but would if the cost was less. Various areas of my garden have been double dug and in production for varying lengths of time as I've expanded the garden area. Initially, I just used rabbit, duck, and chicken manure from my kids' backyard animals along with homemade compost. About 5 years ago I started using horse manure + sawdust bedding in huge amounts applied in fall or winter as available nearby free for the hauling. Spread on top of soils along with shredded leaves and other organic matter (shredded garden waste, grass clippings, used coffee grounds, chicken manure + bedding, hay/straw sweepings). Some years covered with burlap bags over winter. In spring that soil is amazingly loose, but I've still turned over the bed at least 1 shovel depth then let set before planting. This year I was turned soil over as deep as I could going down 2-3 shovel depths. Horse manure was applied in February rather than in fall and wasn't fully decomposed, so I wanted it deep instead of on top. The tomatoes are growing great and blooming with some fruit. In my cool summer climate it's slow growing until the heat is turned on after July 4 when we have more sunny days over 70. The other difference is we spread the red plastic perforated tomato mulch in the tomato bed and installed 5 more soaker hoses, so I only have to water part of the potatoes & beans in the newest part of the garden. In some of the beds I added additional rabbit manure (raspberries, SFG boxes, strawberries, squash). Time will tell how productivity will be different. A pic of one SFG box with the black water pipe hoops to extend the season with plastic covering. Red cabbage, red lettuces starting to bolt, transplanted flat leaf parsley from self sown middle of the bed, chives on edge, self sown or moved calendula, multiplier onions, broccoli & kale toward back of bed. In another box we used thicker white PVC pipe slipped in 1"x12" pieces of PVC clamped to inside of bed. view of edible garden along gravel driveway (realize the view is too small to really see much) fruit trees underplanted with strawberries, garlic & daylilies with cement blocks holding back soil & planted with herbs & sedums first tree visible is a large Rainier cherry tree and if birds didn't get so many we'd be eating more of them (always thinking of taking it out, but then the cherries come-- then they're nearly gone) hoses run to connect to soakers or other hoses that connect to soakers as spigot is some distance from garden SFG boxes with large orange pots of bush cucumbers + flowers in front, black earth machine cold compost for kitchen waste behind various pots of sedums & herbs on ground along with plastic tote of small seedlings row of raspberries row of tomatoes large zucchini bed between 2 small pear trees with bale of straw & white plastic used on tomatoes previously in the middle of pic (waiting for them to dry before storing, but we keep having rain) yellow raspberries with red blooming bee balm, Monarda on other side of pear trees potatoes here & there more potatoes in compost bins behind main garden squash bed in pallet raised area ladders for green beans, etc. Hope the pics help~ Corrine

I'm kind of having the same problem with my two potted bell peppers. They were both very leggy by late summer so I cut one back to the main stems and left one alone. The leggy one has continued to produce peppers but they are very small (like a couple inches long). The one I cut back is very slowly recovering but it's flowering and just starting to set fruit, so I don't know how it will turn out in comparison yet.

It will effect manufacturers who source all of their furniture products from China and also others that source cut & sew covers, leather and fabrics from China. Depending on the amount of current stock before the tariffs and any shipment thats still on the water will not see the increased tariff. Most manufacturers wasnt prepared for this so new price lists will have to be printed and sent to dealers. And many will wait to see what others will do before they will react. Most will absorb the initial increases as they adjust gradually their prices. Keep in mind that leather and leather furniture from China will take the biggest hit and thats where you will see increases up to 15%. Fabrics are a smaller portion of the overall costs of a upholstered piece, so maybe 5 to 10% increase. If your a fan of low cost retail: Dollar Tree and Harbor Freight will struggle with this and im sure you will see prices go up in that space.