Consolidated Kansas

[RoosterLew]

Oh that is just in the house. The other few hundred are out in the brooder house!

Wow!
So your going to have lots of those Lemon Orps for me right

 

[RoosterLew]

Well I'm pretty torn tonight. We have been having a low egg count from our layers. Monday evening my GF, Shannon, found a half eaten egg. We have been suspecting an egg eater for some time.
When I got there we decided to put them back in the coop and hang around for a bit to see if anybody went back to finish thier snack.
Low and behold OB, our young EE Roo jumps in the nest and starts pecking at what's left.
He knocked part of it to the ground and one of our Wellie hens made a bee line for it and gobbled it up.
Now to get to the nest, OB got on top of the brooder box and then to the nest. We have been having low egg count since before we had the new nest hung over a month ago, and a month ago there was no way he could've reached the nest!
So I figured the hen for our egg eater. So Monday night I isolated her into the horse stall and left OB in the coop.
Tuesday evening, out of 6 hens laying we got 2 eggs. 1 in nest box and 1 in the horse stall... So that pointed the feather back at OB.
So Tuesday night I put him in the horse stall and hen back into coop. Tonight I had 4 eggs in nest. ( none in horse stall, but I didn't figure OB would lay one as HE is less than 4 months old! )
2 of the hens are older so I don't expect them to lay every day, but the other 4 should lay most days.
Needless to say, things are not looking good for OB. Tonight he is in isolation again, & I left an egg in there with him.
The trouble is this... Of course if egg count stay up with OB unable to get to the eggs, and the egg in with him goes missing, our mystery is solved.
However, OB is my favorite bird and I had plans on using him for breeding more EE's. At this point I'd honestly have to say my heart is hoping I am wrong. There are so many reasons he is special to us.
Is there any way of using a Roo to breed where he does not have access to the eggs?
If I keep him away from eggs until he is ready to breed, which will be several more months, will that break the habit?
I think Trish said a couple of weeks ago:" Why does it always have to be your favorite?"

 

[HEChicken]

Rooster, I wouldn't place too much stock in what you observed. They are, by nature, opportunistic, and if an egg is cracked, they will eat the contents. However it does not mean they deliberately broke it open just to eat it. I would observe and make sure that is what is happening before jumping to conclusions. I've had many an egg broken and they'll eat it when that happens, but I've never had one actually break open an egg just to eat it. I know it happens but I think a lot of birds are blamed as egg eaters when they weren't responsible for the breakage.

 

[RoosterLew]

But we have found no other signs of anything else getting the eggs?
We bought 6 Welsummers 6 weeks ago. Most days we get 2 or 3 eggs. Some days 1 and a couple of tomrs none.
I have considered that the girls would go off because of the move. My step-father does have about 25 hounds out there, a few of which run loose. They are In with our younger birds and our coop is quite different than where they were. So we figured they'd be off for a bit. But I thought they'd have settled back on by now. The PO was getting 6 eggs a day! The best we have done is 5 and maybe twice a week we get 4!

 

[HEChicken]

The thing is, with an egg eater, they don't leave it lying around for you to find the evidence. They peck it open and devour it lock, stock and barrel, and you rarely find a trace. It sounds like your GF saw an egg sitting there and then observed a bird going over and eating some of it? That doesn't sound like a dedicated egg eater to me.

There are a lot of factors. For one, I would disbelieve the PO that he was getting 6 eggs a day from 6 laying hens. That almost never happens, and is probably just a tale a seller will tell to make the sale. With the exception of the production egg laying hens, who sometimes will literally lay "an egg a day" for the first year or so of laying, before they burn out altogether, most hens lay between 3-4 eggs a week. So if you have 6 hens, you can count on 1-2 of them being on a "day off" on any given day. I don't believe I have ever gathered the same number of eggs in a day as the number of laying hens I have, no matter how large or small that number is.

The move will certainly put them off for awhile. Excessive heat or cold will also disrupt laying. I know it is frustrating to go without eggs - in December I went 3 1/2 weeks without getting a single egg. But, I am not hearing anything in what you are saying that sounds out of the ordinary to me.

 

[RoosterLew]

Well tyvm for the reassurance. It has been eating at me!
I have noticed only in the last few days we have been getting eggs out of the older hens. I kinda fingered them for taking a break. I'd be very happy if we would get 4 a day at least most days. That would help the feed bill. Not that we have much of a feed bill anyways, lol, but I would like to see SOME return. Just about to start selling eggs to friends, have told them to recoup my investment I'll be charging $57.64 a dozen...

Obviously, We are not producing enough. I'm thinking we need more chickens!

 

[TheDownyChick]

My babies have moved out! I finished the hoop coop. Hubby and I placed the 3.5 week old chickies in it. I hope they will be ok. I worry like a mama hen!

 

[HEChicken]

Just about to start selling eggs to friends, have told them to recoup my investment I'll be charging $57.64 a dozen...

Obviously, We are not producing enough. I'm thinking we need more chickens!

Obviously you need more. Duh. That's how my chicken math really took off. I went from 5 the first year and I was trying to sell the excess to help pay for their feed but ended up in a situation where we weren't using any eggs ourselves because we had to save them all to meet the demand of my customers. So I told DH we need more chickens so we can meet demand and actually eat a few eggs ourselves. 50 birds later....

My babies have moved out! I finished the hoop coop. Hubby and I placed the 3.5 week old chickies in it. I hope they will be ok. I worry like a mama hen!

Yay! They'll be fine, especially at this time of year. How is the little one doing with the slightly crooked leg?

 

[sharol]

My DH said the first dozen cost substantially more that $1000, but since then they have been really cheap.

I intentionally got a 6x8 coop to limit myself to 12 chickens. I had read all the chicken math stuff, and I know me very well. So now I have my 9 hens and 7-8 eggs in the incubator trying for a replacement for my rooster. Let's see, 9 plus (say) 5 is 14. We might be ok in the coop with 14. Right? Someone? Anyone? Of course it is possible that none will hatch. I'm on day 18 and afraid to hope.

Sharol

Well tyvm for the reassurance. It has been eating at me!
I have noticed only in the last few days we have been getting eggs out of the older hens. I kinda fingered them for taking a break. I'd be very happy if we would get 4 a day at least most days. That would help the feed bill. Not that we have much of a feed bill anyways, lol, but I would like to see SOME return. Just about to start selling eggs to friends, have told them to recoup my investment I'll be charging $57.64 a dozen...

Obviously, We are not producing enough. I'm thinking we need more chickens!

 

[sharol]

I have a Welsumer I love dearly, but she is a bit erratic as a layer. I'll get an egg a day for a couple of weeks then 2 eggs the next week. Then about every 5 months, she takes several months off. I know she isn't laying because 1) she stops squatting and 2) she is my only dark egg layer. It seems like little shocks put her off laying (death of her best friend the first time for instance).

Don't be too quick to turn the roo into stew. He may just be eating broken eggs he finds.

25 hounds?

But we have found no other signs of anything else getting the eggs?
We bought 6 Welsummers 6 weeks ago. Most days we get 2 or 3 eggs. Some days 1 and a couple of tomrs none.
I have considered that the girls would go off because of the move. My step-father does have about 25 hounds out there, a few of which run loose. They are In with our younger birds and our coop is quite different than where they were. So we figured they'd be off for a bit. But I thought they'd have settled back on by now. The PO was getting 6 eggs a day! The best we have done is 5 and maybe twice a week we get 4!