Q. (Re- prior questions 517 & 634.) It is interesting that the Ben Yehoyadah says that a chicken lays an egg daily. The Tosfos Rid on the first Amud of the Masechta avers that if a chicken laid an egg every day, it could not be muktzah according to Rashi because it would be expected.
A. The Talmud Shabbos (30b) also mentions in regards to Rabbon Gamliel statement on women bearing children in the days of Moshiach, that chickens lay eggs every day. A similar assertion we find in Baba Kama (92a) on Rabbi Yanay's saying that even the chickens in Avimelech's household, that normally lay eggs daily, (Ein Eliahu and others) did not lay eggs at that time.
In practice, today you can expect in a modern chicken farm using artificial light and depending on the breed, feed and climate, a range from approximately 240 to 350 eggs a year. (The Guinness record is 371, Wikipedia). Those quoted numbers probably would have been less in the uncontrolled free-range situation of olden times. Chickens will also stop laying eggs when brooding, molting or aging.
Given those variants, although in peak conditions chickens should potentially lay eggs almost every day, thus clarifying the Talmudic sayings above and Ben Yehoyoda's reason for the name of the Masechta. In practice, Tosafos Rid statement is also correct.
Horav Shlomo Miller Shlit'a pointed out the ruling of Shulchan Aruch (Y.D. 86: 9) in regards to the intermittent egg-laying cycle of a chicken.
Rabbi A. Bartfeld as revised by Horav Shlomo Miller Shlit"a
Important Numbers
