Do her eggs look or seem thin? I assume you are feeding supplemental oyster grit/shell?
Yeah they do seem thinner than my other birds eggs. No, I just feed them all flock layer feed
I would start feeding your hens oyster shell/grit, I think you will see an improvement right away. Do your chickens have access to dirt to scratch and dig?
Ok thank you!!!
Yes they free range on 7 acres of pasture and woods.
Umm I am unsure, I’ll have to check and get back to you!
All flock and layer are separate types of feed, layer feed has extra calcium added for laying hens while all flock does not. You can feed all flock to laying hens, but they absolutely must have access to oyster shell on the side (actually a good idea whatever you feed) and they must have access to grit on the side no matter what you feed
Humm, they should get their fill of grit on 7 acres ... other BYC'ers may have more experience with calcium in soil percentages.
For clarity, are you feeding them all flock or are you feeding them layer feed.. because those are actually two very different feeds with two different formulations and intended purposes. All flock is meant to be consumed by a flock of birds who are not currently in production as it will not provide excessive calcium for birds who do not need.. it is appropriate for birds who are too young or too old to lay or are male. When in use an appropriate supplemental source of calcium must be provided for those birds who are producing eggs so that they have the amount of calcium that they need in order to do so. Layer feed is designed specifically for actively laying birds and contains more calcium than an all flock appropriate feed. Generally speaking it should provide the appropriate amount of calcium for a laying hen, but you may still see some deficiency that would benefit from supplementation of calcium
Another example of two entirely different things... grit for the purpose of digestion is what the birds would pick up for a free-ranging, however that is not going to provide them supplemental calcium sufficient to support healthy active laying, particularly in today's bird bred for super high production. Some of the confusion probably comes from the accent you will often hear supplemental calcium referred to as oyster shell grit rather than just oyster shell or supplemental calcium which can lead people to equate it with poultry grit which it is not
Even so grit is cheap and never goes bad, worst case scenario if they have it is they don't need it and ignore it. Worst case scenario if they don't have it and end up needing is a bird develops crop issues and dies. In theory they should be able to find their own but it's still cheap insurance just in case they can't for some reason
