HELP My chickens keep laying eggs at night in the coop and then they eat them!??

[zldema]

HELP My chickens keep laying eggs at night in the coop and then they eat them!?? I don't know what to do we have tried everything. We leave the laying boxes open at night, we've put golf balls in them. Anyone ever dealt with this behavior before?
We lost two eggs last night.

 

[orpington13]

Are you sure it is in the middle of the night?

 

[NatureChica]

Yeah and unfortunately the only thing that worked for my little brats was for me to pull an all nighter and take the eggs out as they laid them. Once they get a taste for eggs its hard to stop that behavior. At the time I was in school so pulling an all nighter for something other than homework or studying was hard but I did it enough where they quit eating them afterwhile.

I would make sure they got enough nutrients in their diets to be sure they didnt eat them out of nutritional deficiency, I gave them oyster shells to be sure they didnt have thin eggs that broke accidentally. When an egg breaks they tend to eat it and then they may start intentionally breaking them and eating them....

I asked a bunch of questions of people much wiser than myself and tried everything til something worked. I got frustrated and discouraged because nothing seemed to be working even though I did everything right.

So...I started pulling all nighters.

 

[zldema]

Or it could be very early in the morning like around 4:00-5:00.

 

[zldema]

They have oyster shells, Vitamin's in their water, a big brick of seeds, grass, dirt, sand, bugs galore, and scraps from veggies and fruit.

 

[NatureChica]

I would imagine you tried that first... I agree with what you said about early mornings...it could be.