first eggs, woohoo! both cracked. boo.

[redhouse]

so, my sweet barred rock has just started laying. i'm thrilled!!
laid her first egg on sunday afternoon and then another early this morning. she figured out the nest box the very first time, which is great. (my chicken is so smart...) what's not so great though, is that in her diligence to prepare her nest for laying, she seems to like to move all the straw in there to the side, and then drop those little eggs right on the wood floor of the henhouse. which means that both otherwise perfect little eggs have lovely little holes cracked in one end! inside membranes are still intact, so i'm assuming they'll be fine in the fridge for a bit, but i really would like some non-cracked eggs in the future!

anyone else have a pullet who doesn't like to lay on straw? will she just figure it out? or does anyone have any brilliant tips for how to avoid cracked eggs?

 

[cmjust0]

I threw one of our eggs in the LGD's metal food pan from about a foot or 18" up, trying to splatter it in his bowl, and it bounced back at me and landed in the gravel with only one teeny tiny puncture crack that didn't even break the membrane..

Point being, maybe it's not the chicken's behavior you should address here, but the fact that her eggshells are thin? I can't imagine that the drop from a chicken's butt to a piece of wood is anywhere near as forceful as me intentionally throwing one into a metal pan, afterall.