Lately "the girls" are on a roll, I collected 14 eggs today.
A month ago I was getting just an egg a day. I have been thinking about what has change, and first thing I thought of was they all stopped molting, plus the daylight hours are getting longer each day, even thou temps have been getting cooler to the most part and other than that, that's all I can think of. But no matter what the reason I'm sure enjoying have a good supply of fresh eggs.
But I have been dealing with the past couple of days of a hen eating eggs.
How many,
I'm guessing just one.
There are many reason why hens will eat their eggs.
The shell could be soft or thin and break. I do not think that is the reason because I have not been finding any plus normally in the winter the shell are thicker.
Lack of protein or calcium in their diet. Oyster shells are a good addition and I do need to add some. I ran out a while back but their shells are thick and hard right now.
I'm thinking one of two things, first thing is just boredom. The hens will do this kind of activity when they have been cooped up and with the winds we were having the past few days I noticed they were sending a lot of time in the hen house.
The second reason is the nesting material. I notice some had been move out of the nesting boxes and the bottom of the boxes are of wire. So the eggs could of been breaking because of the lack of enough nesting material..
I did not find any mess from broken eggs today and I did add extra nesting material this morning so maybe that helped.
If it keeps up I could do a couple of things. Find out who and remove her to a separate cage for a while. And the other I already do. I have golf balls in the nest but I do it for snakes but it can work to for this problems also. If they try to break the egg , they will peck it with the beaks and it will not break so they will drop the habit..
Till next time,
Kat
=^..^=
OK-I must ask what the golf ball has to do with snakes. We don't have chickens but have had a problem with snakes getting into birds' nests (in an old mailbox on our front porch) and eating the eggs or baby birds. Just wondering if this might have some usefulness in helping protect the eggs in this case - for the time being the "door is closed" on the mailbox so we don't have the trauma and drama of the snakes on the porch!
ReplyDeleteoh I love fresh eggs, love the funny blue ones, even though we're in the country we're not allowed to have chickens here, but a friend of mine supplies me over the summer
ReplyDeleteSuch a pretty bowl of eggs you collected from your hens. These A's are my favorite breeds because of the beautiful pastel eggs they lay.
ReplyDeleteI am afraid the only way to stop egg eating is to despatch the culprit. We have kept chooks for over 30 years and you have to catch them and despatch them because raw egg is their favorite food. Good luck and best wishes.
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