Ok I have a question. What does the egg song sound like? I have a hen, which I'm 99% positive that is a hen, she is also a silver campine. She has grown a large comb (for her size) and wattles and they are bright red. She has been growing them for I would say about a month, the comb and wattles came in very quickly. All of the sudden she has started screeching and its usually once or twice a day for the last few days. It almost sounds like a cat in heat. At first I really thought there was a cat outside screeching. She will go on and on for maybe 10-15 minutes screeching. Would it be the egg song I'm looking for? Do campines screech like that when they sing the egg song?
Egg song: bok bok bok bok bok bok bok bok BeGOKKKK!, bok bok bok bok bok bok bok bok BeGOKKKK!, etc. This can go on for several minutes and can be very loud. Louder than a rooster crowing. It starts either right after they lay an egg, or a few minutes later. Sometimes a hen skips the song ... gets up from the nesting box with a shy little bok and sneaks away. Sometimes a bossy hen who wants her turn at a particular nest that is in use will stand outside and sing the song as if she is trying to trick the hen who is hard at work into thinking she has already finished.
Our flock started the egg song a few days or so before they started laying.
It isn't unusual to find first eggs in odd places. Even now sometimes we find an egg in a random spot. But clearly they prefer the nesting boxes. We gave them nesting boxes the day after they started laying, and they started using them right away.