Hens aren't laying in nest boxes.....

[acarter26]

Our hens are starting to lay at 16 weeks. 3 white leghorns have been laying over a week now and are using the nest boxes. Our RIR's that have started laying aren't using the boxes. They're either laying on the floor in the coop or outside. Will they eventually learn to use the boxes?

 

[bethgranberg]

Hello welcome to you my girls have never laid in the boxes they have a corner where they all like to go

 

[spacecowgirl]

Do you have enough boxes? Have they seen eggs laying in those boxes? I actually put a fishing bobber ( red and yellow, it's the only round thing I could find at the time ) in my haphazardly put together nest box, and my chicken got the hint after two days. Every day I come out and her egg is gently resting against that bobber! lol!

 

[Mac in Wisco]

We have a few thousand layer hens here... When they are first starting to lay we confine them to the hen house. We then "train" them to use the nest boxes by walking the hen house once an hour picking up any floor eggs (to discourage other birds from laying in the same spot), coaxing birds that are about to lay towards the nest boxes, and breaking up any nests or depressions that they've made in the litter.

This works rather well for us. We have a nest box for every 10 hens, and even with 2500 hens, after they are trained we only find a couple dozen eggs on the floor each day.

 

[Momagain1]

Quote:
HOLY CROW 2500 hens! I just looked at your pages and its wonderful! One question...HOW can you tell which hen lays/not...do you just let them die naturally or are they tagged and you cull after a certain amt of
time? (make sense??)

 

[Mac in Wisco]

Quote:
Thanks. They all come and go as a group and are replaced at 18 months of age. Some end up in our freezer, most go to live markets where they are sold to be somebody's dinner.

 

[acarter26]

We have 3 nest boxes. The girls who are using them are all using the same one!

 

[acarter26]

We also put old Easter eggs in them but it's not helping with the RIR's

 

[spiffwilkie]

I put the eggs from the floor of the coop into the nesting box. Only took about a day for the chickens to figure out where to go.

 

[blinkyfish]

My pullets started to lay a couple weeks ago. The first started off laying in a corner of the coop and couldn't be convinced otherwise. In a moment of inspiration I found a brick nearby, put it in the corner where she was laying, and the next day found an egg in the nest box. The other pullets have been more or less consistent and have followed the first one's lead. I have two nest boxes for 6 birds, and they mostly prefer one box over the other. Good luck.