Calcium for laying females?

[Welshy]

Hiya everyone! Does anyone know how to feed their females crushed egg shells without the males eating them? My mom says to integrate it into their feed but I'm afraid the males organs will be damaged. Anyways, thank you!

 

[cheezenkwackers]

I have a ceramic colander that I put crushed egg shells and oyster shell in. The girls eat what they want and the boys don't touch it!

 

[Texag87]

On this subject, mine are going through a lot more shell than even a couple weeks ago. As soon as I refilled the shell cup, all the hens went over and devoured it. What used to last a week lasted 2 minutes. The drake that was not in jail did not touch it. We did get more eggs than ducks yesterday.

 

[CayugaJana]

I wouldn’t worry a whole lot about the drakes. They tend to let their ladies eat first anyway. They will noodle through the food bowl to find what they want to eat and ignore the shells as much as possible. It won’t hurt them to eat a little.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Mine never eat the shells I toss out. I have seen them nibble on the oyster shell but they don’t eat it like the females do.

 

[Texag87]

The hens did not eat, they devoured the oyster shells like they were peas.

 

[quackiemama]

I agree my girls have been going crazy for the oyster shell but Leonard could care less about it. He is too busy foraging for bugs.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

To distribute crushed Oyster shells I have a 3" pipe end-cap with a drainage hole zip-tied to the wire. So far with my three Runner girls it lasted about a month, but during the last couple of days my new ducks have discovered their need for extra Calcium and i must fill it up every 2-3 days. Each of the two drakes tried it once, figured out it wasn't tasty and they ignore it since then. I don't feed any "layer" feed, only "meat-bird" crumbles/pellets.

 

[Gerty0630]

Backing up what everyone else said. I put a free bowl of egg shells out. My female goes to town and my drake could care less about it. They sort themselves out

 

[Fishkeeper]

Don't put the calcium in the feed. Put it separately and let them pick at it when they need it. That lets the hens get more than any males, but also lets individual birds with different calcium needs get as much or as little as they want.