HELP: Birds eating their eggs

[treedawg]

I'm new to chickens and I'm afraid my new flock of 8 month old barred rock chickens are egg eaters.

I purchased 4 hens and one rooster sevral weeks ago. At first I was getting 3-4 eggs each day and was somewhat smug thinking about how easy this was going to be and I was even a little worried about what I was going to with all the eggs.

Suddenly I was getting 0-1 eggs a day. One day I was working around the coop when I noticed a commotion. A hen laid on the ground and the flock devoured the egg in seconds. I had the floor covered with straw and I removed that thinking that was causing the to lay on the ground. I also added a few golf balls to each nest but still no improvement. I have adjusted the amount of straw in their nesting boxes adding and subtracting.

They have a large coop, 4 nesting boxes with perch

They are allowed to freerange around the farm several times each weeks..

I'm feeding them 16% Layena along with unlimited access to crushed oyster shells.

What am I missing..???

Thx in advance....

td

 

[sumi]

They learned a bad habit, that you will need to break a.s.a.p. Here are some things you can try:

https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/six-tips-on-breaking-your-egg-eater

Best of luck!

 

[duckinnut]

They learned a bad habit, that you will need to break a.s.a.p. Here are some things you can try:

https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/six-tips-on-breaking-your-egg-eater

Best of luck!

All that and vigilance and dedication. Had a bout of it a few years ago and won. Also if an egg gets broken clean it up immediately including all the nesting material and dispose of it. When they return there will be no remnants of it. Their photographic memory will tell them where to go to look for that broken egg, when there is nothing there they will stop checking. But again you REALLY have to stay on top of it. Good luck.