Hi, i'm new to this too my chooks are about 20 weeks old. they free range for most of the day on about a half and acre , i too was awaiting the arrivale of something other than chook pooh every ware, but at at someware between 17 weeks and last week ( 19 weeks ) one of the girls just started to wonder off from the rest and started looking at places were she wouldnt normaly be interested,like in my tool shed for instance paying alot of attention to the shelving ware all my odds and sods are kept,, in my Garage, again spending alot of time looking at any ledge or shelf that was more than a foot ( 300 mm) off the groung clucking a lot more than usual all the time. ihad neating boxes in their coop and some just outsice their coop with hey in them, then one day last week, she layed her first egg in the nest box inside the coop. the boxes were there since they were about 12 weeks old and i hadn't moved them, just replaced the hay. Her first egg was verry small no bigger than a pidgion egg , but now i get one a day, normal small size. i think she was just looking fof somthing that instinct was telling her, but my Sister said they just like consistancy and comfortable surroundings and not to change things around too much. i can basicly toss all the other supremo nesting boxes i made in the bin as she only lays in the old 20 letre bucket that was left there as an after thought. ha ha .