Egg Eating HORSE?!! What is going on around here?

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Bunnylady

Bunnylady

POOF Goes the Pooka
12 Years
Nov 27, 2009
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9,816
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Wilmington, NC
I have two miniature horses, Blondie and Syd. For some reason, several of my free-ranging hens prefer to lay their eggs in one corner of Syd's stall. This hadn't been a problem until recently. Normally, I pull several eggs per day out of that stall, but for the last week, I haven't gotten any. I suspected an egg-eating chicken, so I was keeping a pretty close eye on the stall. When I put Syd in to feed her this morning, I saw one white egg in the corner, and made a mental note to get it when I let her out. When I let Syd out, the egg was being hidden by another hen that had moved in to make her contribution, so I left her alone, intending to get both eggs when she left the stall. A few minutes later, I heard her squawking. It wasn't the egg song, it sounded more like an alarm call. When I went to check the stall, I found Blondie in there, slurping up the contents of two broken eggs! I couldn't believe it! Has anyone ever heard of a horse doing this?

My horses and goats get to use the stalls as run-in shelters most of the time, I guess I'll close the door to that one for the time being. Anybody have any suggestions on what else I can try?
 
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My horse Diva (the one that loves wormer) and 2 of my minis, eat eggs....... crazy critters....
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I knew a horse that ate some eggs, on accident once. I used to work at a small ranch and the ranch owner one day put hay in the horse's mangers early in the morning. Around noon time when the horses came in to eat hay, some chickens had laid their eggs in one of the hay filled mangers. Fancy, a 22 yr old QH, mowed into the hay, only to get a mouthful of eggs that she was doing her best to spit out.

I tried giving one of my horses an egg salad sandwich once. Didn't like it. DH's old horse used to eat ham sandwiches and drink cherry coke.
 
The Irish guy that breaks our yearlings keeps a large tupperware of eggs in vinegar (in the shells) and every horse in training gets an egg in it's feedtub for breakfast. He says that's a fairly common practice in Ireland!
 
I can't speak to egg-eating horses, but I did see a wild deer eat an egg from a whippoorwill nest one time (I used to be a bird biologist). I guess plant-eaters like a little eggstra protein sometimes
gig.gif


Melissa
 
I was pretty sure that I had heard that some people fed horses raw eggs (some people give them beer, too!), and I can see that the nutrients in eggs could be good for them. I could also see that their dog-like curiosity might inspire a mini to sample one. But I never imagined they would like them well enough to eat them straight!
 

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