4 birds,4 layers,now 3 layers

[feathersnuggles]

Quote:
As long as you are offering them good quality layer feed and, hopefully, some free-choice oyster shell or crushed egg shells (as they need lots of calcium for the shells)... there's no need to worry yet. Give her some time. I have a hen, not the broody, that recently stopped laying, too. She apparently needed a break to refresh her shell gland. She had been laying, then stopped for about a week suddenly. During the break she laid a couple shell-less eggs from the roost at night (which were consumed by the others in the flock, yuk!) Anyway, after a week or so, she started laying good hard-shelled eggs again, in the nest as usual.

During formation, the egg spends the bulk of its time, 20+ hours, in the shell gland of the hen's oviduct -- being covered in layers of liquid calcium carbonate and pigment. I'm no expert, but I sense the shell gland, at times, needs to rest and refresh.

 

[spamee34]

Have you heard of the top hen acting as a rooster if you don't have a rooster? I have red this on the internet when I was thinking of getting chickens that is why I decided to get a rooster. It is a dominance thing they said one hen will stop laying to take on the rooster role of protcting the flock .

 

[Sunburst Coop]

Thank you for your reply feathersnugglers. We got an egg from her yesterday and I know it was her as she is the only EasterEgger we've got. As an added bonus, it was larger than any of her previous eggs. Now this morning, there was a soft egg underneath the evening perch. All intact but extremely soft. its a wonder it didn't break open on impact. Now this one was brown thus it was from one of the RIR's so that tells me some calcium is missing in their diet or am I completely off base? We're fairly new to all of this.

Brad

 

[Sunburst Coop]

Quote:
I've heard that too but we've usually been getting an egg per hen a day. Kind of easy to tell since we only have three at the moment. I'm enlarging the pen (chain link dog run) today and we'll see about getting a few more once they get back to consistently laying hard eggs again.

Thanks for your reply.

Brad

 

[feathersnuggles]

Quote:
Yes, to your calcium question. Get some oyster shell from the feed store and offer it free-choice in a dish in their run or where they can access it each day. Hens will take what they need, sometimes more and sometimes less. They know what they need. Oyster shell is cheap. I also dry their eggshells and crush them, putting them into the "shell" dish too. They will eat quite a bit of calcium, when they are laying lots of eggs.

I took a large tunafish can, cleaned & dried it and nailed it to a wall in their run, at their shoulder height. Every few days, I put more shell into the dish. That's my cheap solution for a free-choice dish, that stays relatively clean.


ETA: as a quick emergency treatment for a hen lacking calcium, you can crush 1/2 Tums and mix with some plain yogurt and feed it. It's not calcium carbonate, but can help them quickly get additional calcium while you run to the feedstore for your crushed oyster shell.

 

[mboreham1]

Hey Brad,

Soft egg normally = lower calcium, just offer them an unlimited supply of oyster shell, you can get it cheaply at any feed store, i break conventional wisdom and let them have access to it prior to them laying, i have NEVER EVER had anything but hard shells, hard enough to cut you if you crack it incorrectly when making a saturday morning omlette! I use an old potato salad tub attached to the side of my coop, i fill it weekly. The chickens know when they want some, jsut like they know when they are hungry.

I had a bantam mille fleur started laying a lovely cream looking egg daily for about 8 weeks, then quit for about 6 weeks, no rhyme or reason, not big enough for a crock pot and she eats hardly anything other than what she finds in the back yard so i let her be, then 6 weeks ago she started laying again, daily. I get about 13 eggs every 14 days from her. When they are young some chickens seem to go at it like a bat out of hell, run out of steam, rest and start on a more manageable, consistant pace. I have 3 RIR's the same age as the bantam, they all started laying within a week of each other and have not quit since.

Hopefully this hardens your egg shells and buys your EE a little extra time to regualte her egg production!

 

[Sunburst Coop]

Thank you all. Looks like its off to the feed store. Thankfully, they're just down the street.

Brad

 

[feathersnuggles]

Quote:
That's great you got a rooster. I love roosters!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Many urban-dwellers don't keep a rooster because their neighbors don't appreciate the early morning crowing. I used to have a little rooster. He was a very good boy, but his crowing made us reconsider things, so we finally found a nice new home for him on a great farm not too far away. The hens seemed to miss him for about 2 days. His presence brought a wonderful energy to the flock - and I've missed that energy since he left. If I ever move to a more rural place, I'm getting roosters, for sure!