Hi everyone, hope you can give me some guidance or assurance. I have 5 Barred rocks that are 23 weeks old. One of them started laying small eggs a month ago. She gave us about 9 tasty little eggs then started giving us shell less eggs ever since. So far about 18 shell less. They are eating layer pellets with 4.5% calcium, have free choice oyster shells, free range about 5 hours a day, have clean fresh water with a little ACV added and couple of handfuls of cracked corn before bed. The yolks are all very orangey yellow and look good. The girls are all very healthy looking and active including the one laying shell less eggs. I see no mites or worms. None of the others are laying yet but are showing signs. Is this just a case of young hen getting used to laying eggs? Should I find another source of calcium? Am I impatient? Why normal shell eggs then shell less? Thanks for reading.
There are a lot of causes and not unusual for some to have malformed eggs early. But since she was laying shelled eggs early it would concern me to see so many shell less eggs showing up. Since early ones had shells would assume no genetic issues. If acting normally then not likely illness. Is she bottom of pecking order and may not be getting her fair share of feed or supplemental calcium? Consider adding a flock block they have some additional calcium supplementation. Observe her feed intake. Likely you'll get some more comments from the long term flock owners to help answer the issue.
As the above poster said she could still be getting used to laying, but it's possible that she's not getting enough calcium and have depleted her stores with the first few eggs. Offer them some crushed oyster shell or egg shells in a bowl separate from their feed and cut back a little bit on the scratch in the evenings.
She doesn't seem to be at the bottom of the pecking order. Since we had to get rid of our rooster she seemed to take over. She free ranges with the others for about 5 hours a day but I never observe them eating their layer pellets as they're inside the coop. Thanks for the suggestion of the flock block. I'll try and find one today.
