CAN YOU FEED CHICKENS EGG SHELLS????

[Papadavid]

I just take my shells out in the pasture, step on them a couple of times and watch Zack and the girls make them disappear. Sometimes they eat them all and some times they leave some until later. No egg eater problems with my chickens.

 

[CoyoteMagic]

I believe egg eaters are made when shells are thin and crack. You know a chicken has to check it out. Once they get the taste, they are done for. They won't quit.

Like others here, I have an old cake pan in the oven and toss the shells in. When it's full and they've been toasted and dried, I crush them and throw them out in the run.

I'm a firm believer that a chicken isn't going to eat anything that's going to kill them. Mine have stuck their heads in a bucket of paint, shook their pretty pink heads, wiped their beaks and continued on their way. Cussing me but fine.

 

[NYREDS]

I don't know anyone who doesn't feed egg shells back to their hens.
The notion that it will encourage them to eat eggs is nonsense. Chickens don't have the intellectual capacity to relate crushed egg shells to whole eggs. Thatr would require higher order thinking, much beyond a chicken's capacity. Just because something's printed in a magazine doesn't make it accurate. I read an article in a magazine recently that siad white eggs come from white chickens & brown eggs come from brown chickens.

 

[Tamrajh]

I used to give my girls the whole egg shells. If an egg was cracked, or when I was getting to many eggs, I would just throw it on the ground so they could eat the egg, yoke and shell. Never had any egg eaters.

 

[kathyinmo]

I am in the minority here, I guess. I do not feed egg shells to my chickens. I keep Oyster Shell available for them at all times. I use my crushed egg shells and used coffee grounds in my flower beds and vegetable garden.

 

[Surehatch]

Egg shells should provide a good source of problem-free calcium

 

[goldeneggtees]

Hi, so, for those of you who feed egg shells, do you not feed oyster shell then? Or are egg shells in addition to oyster shells?

 

[RocketDad]

I give oyster shell in addition to egg shell. I have a couple of neighbors who get eggs, so I don't have shells for every egg they lay, plus there's always metabolic loss.

 

[Mrs. Fluffy Puffy]

Yes, I feed mine Egg Shells.

I bake them then crumble them up and put them in a jar. Then when they jar gets full I mix it in with their pellets and feed it to them.

 

[SurprisingWoman]

Yesterday it was snowing her in Utah (eyeroll) so I took three eggs, smashed them in a glass pie plate, shell and all.

I scrambled them for a couple of minutes in the microwave and fed it to the girls. Warm, protein, and calcium. What's not to love?

I do have a 50# bag of oyster shell but I do it all. Why not? I don't have any problems with my girls.