Please don’t block the nests off again. All that will do is teach them to lay in some other place when they do start. I know many people worry about the nests being available will cause them to sleep in the nests. There are several different reasons they may sleep in the nests. The roosts may be too low or you may not have enough roost space, you may have a bully that is a brute on the roosts so the weaker ones look for a safer place to sleep, or you may have birds like Silkies that can’t fly so they have trouble getting to the roosts. Personally I would want to know if they are going to sleep in the nests before they start to lay so I could figure out why they are doing that and fix the problem before I get poopy eggs and find them laying in places other than the nests.
When chickens find a new spot, they investigate it. Part of that investigation is to scratch around looking for food. Also, about a week before they start to lay, many pullets (not all but many) start to look for a good place to make a nest. Sometimes a rooster will help them look for that good place. They scratch around to see if it can be remodeled to be suitable. I want them to do all that before they start to lay so I can fix a problem if there is one.
It sounds like they are scratching the nesting material out when they are investigating, whether it is for food or looking for a good place to lay. You might try raising the lip of the nest so it is harder for them to scratch that bedding out. I’ve had that problem before and adding a couple of inches to that lip made all the difference in the world. If the lip is too low, they can scratch out fake eggs and real eggs too, not just the bedding.
