Egg eating hens ...do I have to kill them?

Aneesa's Muse

Songster
11 Years
Jun 8, 2008
999
2
164
SF Bay Area
I have a very small backyard flock ..3 Black Stars that I raised from chicks ..and Ben, my little Faverolle bantam roo. In the last day or so, I have discovered fewer eggs ..you easily notice this when there's only 3 to be expected anyway
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...and I found "chewed up" shells, as well.

I am really sick about this ..I feed them all very well ..take really good care of them ..the whole bit. And this is what I'm rewarded with. I've been ill about it all day, actually. DH just walked in here and said.. "It's raining out now, you may want to go close up the coop... " ...but the way I feel, I really could care less. (I'll put a diaper on Ben and bring him back inside ..and get new hens ..or raise up new chicks for him again)

Harsh? Maybe...

Can I reverse this behaviour ...or is it time to stock my freezer with fresh, handraised hens? (I ask, cuz my Daddy and I killed all suspected egg eaters ..he said there was no cure for such behaviour ..so it's just what we did, back on our farm.)


~Heartbroken
 
Give them oyster shell. Also put a couple golfballs in the nesting box and collect the real eggs regularly. They can be broken. I broke mine.
 
Build your nestbox so the eggs roll out the back into a catcher. Just a box with a slanted floor. Opening in the back high enough to let the eggs roll out but not allow the hens access to them once they lay. Put carpet or foam on the catcher tray to keep the eggs from breaking.
 
They have fake eggs in the nest ..they get oyster shell already ..I even raise bugs (mealworms, tropical roaches, redworms) ...and bake "chicken cakes" for them. They are WELL FED!!

I go out and get the eggs, as soon as, I hear them cackle or Ben crow.. he's more the "egg announcer" than they are. I do this quite often, as I'm a fulltime homemaker ...and an active gardener, too.

How long did it take you to break them? I am really a little "beside myself" ..money wasted, so to speak....
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We have had ours eat eggs once in a while. I have found that they do it mostly in the winter, possibly a dietary deficiency or just boredom, or both. I have read that giving black oil sunflower seeds helps, and it does seem to. Ours are free range and the egg eating problem seems to go away for the most part once the weather improves and they can go outside and find other things to do. You might want to find things to give them to entertain themselves...lots of people have ideas they've posted, like giving them milk jugs, suet bells on a string, hiding treats in the straw. You can also try filling a plastic Easter egg with sand and putting it in the nest, or a golf ball. If I were you I wouldn't cull the egg eaters, just yet, anyway, give them a month or two. And, you might want to make sure it's the chickens...sometimes rats chew up eggs and leave the shells in the nest.
 
They get Black Oil Suns already ..they have TOYS in the coop ..and they are not kept penned up all day, as we live in a milder climate and they are roaming in their run ..that I forfeited HALF of my garden and tortoise's space for.
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The fake eggs have sand in them, too.

I won't kill them just yet... but Louise, aka. Weezer, attacked me today ..when I took the pieces of broken shells away from her. It's not rats.. I have a monstrous feral Tom that hovers and lingers on my back fence.
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