Hanksjordan
In the Brooder
- Aug 2, 2020
- 14
- 10
- 24
Hi Everyone. I've posted before, months back right after we got our chickens.
We have 6 chickens, a variety of breeds. All supposedly great layers. They hit laying age right as it got cold (we live in Utah).
They have a coop that is insulated good, but not great. We don't need heat lamps or artificial light for various reasons we've learned about.
We suspect 2-3 of the chickens are laying, because we'll usually get 1 egg per day. Total. Haven't been too concerned because it's winter, it's cold, and they're new layers.
What's weird and what I'm looking for insight on is their egg-laying patterns and what we're seeing. It's weird.
Their coop has roosting bars for each of them, and they finally use them (after a little teaching). One of the layers is laying her egg either WHILE roosting, because we see the eggs inside the coop, right under her roosting bar on the pile of poop that has accumulated from her while roosting. OR, she's laying on the pile of poop before she goes up on the roosting bar.
We occasionally find an egg in the nesting boxes. We used to do a golf ball in there, semi-worked. Inconclusive. Then we took the golf ball out, and egg randomly would be in the nesting box. But then one chicken was hogging the nesting box (there are two boxes, so I'm not sure what the problem is) and egg activity in the boxes ceased. So we've refreshed both nesting boxes, added fresh straw, and put one fake egg in both. Since then, we haven't seen much activity. Chicken no longer hogging box.
Long story longer, the eggs are often inside the coop, or underneath the coop where they hang out during the day, but almost never in the actual nesting boxes. They're gettin broken, stepped on, eaten, or are out of reach because they're under the coop where the girls hang out and we can't reach.
Any insight would be so appreciated. Between our 6 chickens, we're getting about 3 eggs per week.
We have 6 chickens, a variety of breeds. All supposedly great layers. They hit laying age right as it got cold (we live in Utah).
They have a coop that is insulated good, but not great. We don't need heat lamps or artificial light for various reasons we've learned about.
We suspect 2-3 of the chickens are laying, because we'll usually get 1 egg per day. Total. Haven't been too concerned because it's winter, it's cold, and they're new layers.
What's weird and what I'm looking for insight on is their egg-laying patterns and what we're seeing. It's weird.
Their coop has roosting bars for each of them, and they finally use them (after a little teaching). One of the layers is laying her egg either WHILE roosting, because we see the eggs inside the coop, right under her roosting bar on the pile of poop that has accumulated from her while roosting. OR, she's laying on the pile of poop before she goes up on the roosting bar.
We occasionally find an egg in the nesting boxes. We used to do a golf ball in there, semi-worked. Inconclusive. Then we took the golf ball out, and egg randomly would be in the nesting box. But then one chicken was hogging the nesting box (there are two boxes, so I'm not sure what the problem is) and egg activity in the boxes ceased. So we've refreshed both nesting boxes, added fresh straw, and put one fake egg in both. Since then, we haven't seen much activity. Chicken no longer hogging box.
Long story longer, the eggs are often inside the coop, or underneath the coop where they hang out during the day, but almost never in the actual nesting boxes. They're gettin broken, stepped on, eaten, or are out of reach because they're under the coop where the girls hang out and we can't reach.
Any insight would be so appreciated. Between our 6 chickens, we're getting about 3 eggs per week.
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