Help, please. Can a snake eat many eggs at once???

So, it appears that I have a snake problem..or do I? Can someone please tell me what the most eggs they've had a snake get from a nest in a night?? Does anyone have an experience with a snake eating many eggs in one night, or does it tend to be just a few at a time??

Chicken snakes (Rat Snakes) are something that I run across from time to time at my house. I have a Silver Laced Wyandotte that was sitting on 18 eggs. She was on them daily, and I was hoping that they would hatch, and she would teach them the ways of a chicken. Last Thursday, all 18 eggs were in the nest. On Friday I went to check on them, and every single one of them were gone. There wasn't a single piece of a shell anywhere to be found.

I was and I am still puzzled. For there to be no shell pieces anywhere made me think that it looked like a snake's handywork. However, I did not think that a single snake could eat 18 in one night. I can not rule out multiple snakes, but my chickens have been laying for months, and I have not noticed missing eggs before that night. What are the chances that multiple snakes would just so happen to hit a nest in the same night, ya know?

Well, someone told me that a large snake could eat all 18 in one night. Someone else told me that 4-5 would probably be the most one could take.

ALSO--- The next night, I thought that I had a snake problem, and I took a dozen eggs from another nest, and I put them in the Wyandotte's nest. Then I boiled 2 eggs, cut a slit in them with a serrated knife, inserted a small hook tied with fine braided line, anchored it to the wall, and I placed them with the rest of the eggs. The next morning, hoping to find a snake on the line, I was surprised to find all of the eggs gone, again, but this time there were pieces of shells in the coop. I thought that it might have been an opossum or my chickens smelled the boiled eggs with the slits and went to town eating them all. It was bad luck, either way.

Thank you very much!

Replace eggs with golf balls...should solve your problem if it's a snake and if it's the same one.

I would guess opposum or skunk. Your hen that was sitting on the eggs wasn't touched?

did you notice snakes never eat muscovy duck eggs?

I lost 2 roosters and a hen to a great barred owl in July. Those chickens decided they wanted to roost outside of the "coop". Since then, I didn't have a loss until the other day--and those losses were only eggs. No chickens were touched.

I put out golf balls a month or 2 ago getting ready for the snakes. There was actually 2 balls in this nest. Perhaps they are regurgitating the balls--if they're taking them.

I have something in mind for the snakes, I'm more or less trying to figure out if it is a snake that I'm dealing with. In your experiences, do ya'll see times when a snake doesn't eat the entire clutch?

**great horned owl

angel8035 said:

I would guess opposum or skunk. Your hen that was sitting on the eggs wasn't touched?

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I was wondering about that too!

animals1981 said:

did you notice snakes never eat muscovy duck eggs?

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Yes, snakes will eat muscovy eggs. Before we had chickens we raised only muscovys and cattle. We had some very fat rat snakes. My husband caught one in the nest swallowing a muscovy egg. The snake had already eaten a few because you could still see the egg shaped lumps!

A rat snake ate 2 3 week old ducks and was getting ready for more. Years back I had one est all 6 wood duckilings I had in a brooder. They will eat all the eggs that are there and not have to eat for a while

They are constrictors and will kill the hen if she doesn't get off the nest