four days in a row from first to shell less egg

[Feike]

one of my RiR finally started laying.....from a small hard shell egg every day (4days now) to a shell less egg, weird I thought, this is my first of 9 chickens 5-6 months old and is laying but the eggs are getting worse....I hope it's the hen just trying to get used to laying eggs, since they free range have a mix of scratch, pellets, oyster shell and grit....I have no clue what's going on

 

[Judy]

Quote:
Most on here offer these separately, so they can take what they want, and offer scratch only in small amounts as a treat. Most scratch mixes are low protein and not nutritionally complete, no vitamins and minerals, etc.

I hope she's just doing the odd things they do when starting to lay, and will straighten out in a month or so.

 

[Feike]

so what is the ideal combination of food for free range chickens?
So I should offer the different food except for grit seperately?

 

[Buff-Island-Australorp]

I too have 9 hens, and my first one to lay was one of my RIR. Here's a generic rundown of how things have played out with all of them.

first egg
skip a day
second egg
skipped a couple days
good eggs for about 10 days with a skip in there
then a couple more hens started laying
found another shell-less egg
more hens started laying
found good eggs, and 2 shell-less eggs on the coop floor
then 2 good eggs
AND TODAY.....I'VE BEEN TREATED TO (7) GOOD EGGS.

Now, my events above are brief and not 100% accurate as far as "day to day", but I think you get the jist of it.

Several posters on here have said it takes a good while to get new laying pullets into a solid egglaying mode, so I'm just taking the good with the bad and going with the flow.

I wouldn't worry a single bit!!

 

[Feike]

thank you so much....

 

[Farm_Maven]

I leave them layer 24/7. I have grit and oyster shell out 24/7 (unless it sneaks up "empty" on me). They often spill the shell because I don't have an extra hanging feeder, but they will still eat it off the ground. The scratch......they only get once a day for a treat, then they get other treats as available, I.E. food scraps. I also keep the eggshells when I use eggs, and crush them and feed them back along with the oyster shell. On a side note, I think I will make another feeder for the oyster shell out of an empty water jug like I did for the little one's water. They were knocking over the chick waterer I had out for them.