Paper thin egg shells

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jwing7

jwing7

In the Brooder
9 Years
Aug 20, 2010
11
0
22
Can anyone tell me why all of a sudden my chickens are laying eggs with egg shells so thin that when they get get from laying the egg breaks. Please help!!!!!!
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Could be a number of reasons.
1. Are they getting enough calcium in their diet? You may want to supplement with oyster shell calcium. It's cheap, they eat it readily and it really improves the shells. There should be calcium carbonate in their laying feed also. Hopefully you're feeding laying feed or flock raiser with at least 16% protein and not a chick growing feed now.
2. How old are your birds? Youngish hens will often lay weird eggs of all kinds. Tiny, enormous, thin shells, no shells, extra thick shells, wrinkled, lumpy, no yolk, double yolk. It takes a while for their egg laying mechanism to settle in and function reliably. Mine are 7 months old now and I still get an occasional weird egg.
3. Any unusual stresses on them lately? Move the coop, introduce new chickens, one died, illness, worms, major change in their diets, moulting, a really cold snap in the weather... they sometimes respond to it by laying strange eggs or stop laying altogether.


Stay tuned... there'll be lots of people chiming in to help you!
And welcome to BYCF, btw
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I get one of those every once in a while. Do you have oyster shell for them? maybe they need more calcium. I feed our chickens some of the yolks from their eggs, cooked of course, but I crush some of the shell in with it. a little extra calcium for them.
 
My hens are about 9 months old I think. We did get a new Rooster and they all had the sniffles for a while but think we got that cleared up and then we did worm them. I have only gotten one so guess I won't worry too much. We do have osyter shell for them and I also crumble and feed them their egg shells. This is all so new to me but we are very attached already. Thanks for all you help and great info.
 
When I cook eggs, I save all the shells. When I have a pan full, I put them in the oven for just a few minutes to dry them completely. Place them in a ziplock bag and crush them finely with a rolling pin. I add them back to the chickens' feed. They like it better than oyster shell and it does the same job. Also costs nothing.
 
hi, we only have 4 chickens. but I have a one that was a great daily layer then about 2-3 months ago she laid a massive 102gram egg (usually only lays 80g) since then she's been doing all sorts of weird things, laying rough thin shell in nest box, lays thin shell from where she roosts at night, she sometimes has odd shaped eggs ie. still thin and rough shell but the pointy end is like a small bubble , disposition changed....been very nasty to our 2 little silky bantams. they've all been given vit D and that worked briefly for her, plenty of shell grit, not so much greenery sometimes they only free range pick when we get home from work...say 4.30 to sunset. we thought she might have been damaged after laying the enormous egg....any ideas on how we might help her...I don't want eggs to break inside her. thanks
 
Franbo said:
hi, we only have 4 chickens. but I have a one that was a great daily layer then about 2-3 months ago she laid a massive 102gram egg (usually only lays 80g) since then she's been doing all sorts of weird things, laying rough thin shell in nest box, lays thin shell from where she roosts at night, she sometimes has odd shaped eggs ie. still thin and rough shell but the pointy end is like a small bubble , disposition changed....been very nasty to our 2 little silky bantams. they've all been given vit D and that worked briefly for her, plenty of shell grit, not so much greenery sometimes they only free range pick when we get home from work...say 4.30 to sunset. we thought she might have been damaged after laying the enormous egg....any ideas on how we might help her...I don't want eggs to break inside her. thanks
Click to expand...



Bump, since is seems you didn't get an answer yet.
 
jwing7 said:
Can anyone tell me why all of a sudden my chickens are laying eggs with egg shells so thin that when they get get from laying the egg breaks.  Please help!!!!!!/img/smilies/sad.png
Click to expand...

Friday one of our girls died, yesterday we introduced 2 pullets into the coop...this morning paper thin egg. In our case, it was stress. Make sure you give them oyster shell with their feed.
 

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