Ate their first egg?

[Slinkee]

My girls are 20 weeks old as of today. This morning I went out to find their first egg....that they'd already eaten. Cause for concern? Is this normal? Suggestions?

 

[Tamara119]

Congrats on the first egg! That looks like it was a soft-shelled egg. If it was it might have broken by itself. My hens will eat eggs that are broken, but they don't intentionally break the eggs themselves. Hopefully the next egg(s) will have tougher shells and won't break. If your pullets start breaking the eggs themselves, you'll need to fix them of that habit quickly. The best solution I've read around here (but fortunately haven't had to try yet) is to make a hole in an egg, blow out its contents and refill with Dijon mustard. Then place the Dijon egg in the nest and your egg-breaker will break it, taste the Dijon and be scarred for life! They HATE mustard! If the eggshells continue to be soft after the first week, you'll need to up their calcium intake. Often their first few eggs or small or soft-shelled, so it should normalize within a few days.

 

[Slinkee]

Thanks for the response! Yes, I did notice the shell was quite soft. I was crossing my fingers it simply broke and they were investigating it! Hopefully we'll have more eggs soon and this was an isolated incident.