Egg Casualty!!!

[wsdareme]

After waiting what seemed like YEARS for our young hens to start laying, the magic event began earlier this week. We've gotten two eggs each day since Monday. One hen seems to be good with laying in a nest box, but we've found a number of eggs under the nest boxes, under the poop board below the roosts, random location on the floor. I closed up the space under the roosts and the nest boxes to encourage laying IN the nest boxes. Well, one of the hens has apparently decided that the roost is better than the nest box. Unfortunately, the egg did not survive the fall onto the poop board.

Has anyone else had this problem? Is this going to be an ongoing issue? I really would like to find the eggs in one piece!

 

[PineappleMama]

I've been VERY lucky that our girls figured out the box and stick to it.

ONE time there was an egg on the bottom of the coop... perhaps en route to the nest or nest already in use?
And once there was a soft shelled egg, same as above.

But that was in the VERY early stages of them laying... no problems since.

If there's no other 'comfy' spot, and there's enough boxes to be had by all, eventually they tend to figure it out.. unless you've got a really stubborn one... I've read about eggs being under the lawnmower of all places!