Odd eggs

hmbrown05

In the Brooder
5 Years
Sep 4, 2014
97
1
43
Texas
I have two hens that are laying odd eggs. These girls are both about 6 months old. One is a leghorn who keeps laying a membrane only egg always very early in the morning (unfortunately I can't figure out which one as I have 8 leghorns :/ and we are talking earlier than 6 am before sun-up), and a plymouth bar rock who keeps laying a very thin shelled egg with very little pigment and quite infrequently for her age/breed. The eggs are calcified, but feel rough like fine grit sandpaper and they break very easily.

They are on a laying feed and have oyster shell free feed and are free ranged throughout the day and roosted in the coop at night. The other 11 hens all lay normal, thick shelled eggs. Everyone's crops and waddles are bright, healthy appearing red and otherwise bright, alert and happy. I do have two other leghorns with bumbble foot, but no other's showing signs.

Is there something that can be addressed that I am just missing or do these hens need to be culled?
 
I wonder if they are the lowest in your pecking order and not getting as much food. One story I read on here involved a hen starving to death because of the pecking order. You could separate them for a while if you haven't yet. You could control food and water and get a chance to see if there are other symptoms....
If it's a food issue they should start laying normally again. Then you could reintroduce them. Hope that helps, good luck.
 
Try putting the feed and water in addition to the oyster shell in at least two locations. Chickens love to eat crushed egg shells as well, at treat time. Mine will eat egg shell before the oyster shell if left ina popular spot.
 
I wonder if they are the lowest in your pecking order and not getting as much food. One story I read on here involved a hen starving to death because of the pecking order. You could separate them for a while if you haven't yet. You could control food and water and get a chance to see if there are other symptoms....
If it's a food issue they should start laying normally again. Then you could reintroduce them. Hope that helps, good luck.


I have these two youngins. Like 18 weeks and they are lowest in the ranks but not picked on. I just use two short sided tubs and split the food. That way they can eat all together. All my 27 week old ladies crowd the one tub so much you couldn't fitr another chicken lol
 
I see what you mean, but their food is in their coop with free access via a pop up door throughout the day so even if they are at the bottom of the pecking order, they should be able to get feed/shells while everyone else is out and about. BUT it won't hurt to try!

Are some egg issues genetic though I wonder??
 
I see what you mean, but their food is in their coop with free access via a pop up door throughout the day so even if they are at the bottom of the pecking order, they should be able to get feed/shells while everyone else is out and about. BUT it won't hurt to try!

Are some egg issues genetic though I wonder??


My experience with weird egg laying goes like this My Rhode Island red was laying eggs with shells that were so soft that every time they came out they broke and she wasn't even laying them in the nest box because of it. I believe she knew that they were messed up and didn't want to soil the nest box. She would lay it in the area where they sleep usually and they actually don't sleep on a roost even know they have a bunch of them available they like to sleep on top of their coop. So of course they poop all over the place. LOL well she finally started laying normal eggs because I made scrambled eggs and added the eggshells in with the raw eggs put them in a blender, whizzed them up and then cooked them and fed them to her like two days in a row and she finally started laying eggs that weren't breaking. she laid one on the ground it had one side that was flat and really thick shelled but at least she's finally laying eggs that can stay together. So I think it's something they have to work out with themselves and overtime they will lay normally and lay normal eggs and maybe you have to supplement the eggshell in the scrambled eggsto get them started. I think the problem with my Rhode Island was that she didn't want to eat the oyster shell or any of the calcium so putting the eggshells in the eggs of course she's going to eat the eggs therefore she's going to get the calcium that she needs to make hard shells. I just hope she keeps laying them normally and doesn't go back to the soft shelled eggs. Crossing fingers
 






Since I got the iPhone upgrade my phone sucks and is so slow so hopefully these photos work..
 
Thank you! I have plans to grow my flock and while these girls are not pets, I am not really at a point that I want to start culling. They definitely won't be breeders, but I would like to still get some production out of thsm if I can relatively easily make that happen. I do feed their shells back to them, but haven't in a week or more as we haven't been eating quite as many eggs. I will definitely give that a try!
 
Thank you! I have plans to grow my flock and while these girls are not pets, I am not really at a point that I want to start culling. They definitely won't be breeders, but I would like to still get some production out of thsm if I can relatively easily make that happen. I do feed their shells back to them, but haven't in a week or more as we haven't been eating quite as many eggs. I will definitely give that a try!


One thing I caution you is don't give the scrambled eggs and egg shell concoction to the ones who are laying normal shelled eggs. It can be too much calcium and cause rough or deformed egg shells. But def give t to the ones laying mushy eggs lol
 

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