How do I avoid egg eating?

[chicken mama 0908]

Do I need a ball per box? I only have 3 golf balls.

 

[WendyTestaburger]

Yep, and you don't need curtains.
I put one or two fake eggs in each of my four nests, it helps spread the love.

There's nothing wrong with putting curtains up though.

ETA: it can't HURT

 

[aart]

Do I need a ball per box? I only have 3 golf balls.

Use what you have for now.
How many nests?

 

[chicken mama 0908]

I want to put up curtains. I looked them up online and they are super cute, but I have no idea how to make them. I do have cloth.

 

[chicken mama 0908]

Use what you have for now.
How many nests?

12, but the laying hens prefer the same one (not all my hens are laying yet) 5 of the boxes are ground level.

 

[WendyTestaburger]

I want to put up curtains. I looked them up online and they are super cute, but I have no idea how to make them. I do have cloth.

I just have screw in hooks above the nest boxes. I cut the fabric in one square per nest box so they can push them aside to walk through and they drape back/close behind the girls nicely to give them privacy.

I cut holes in the fabric to hang them taught on the hooks. I don't really make them fancy because as they get dirty I just cut new ones and replace them. I'll attach a picture of ours, these cover 3 nest boxes. I think they're super cute

 

[Ridgerunner]

My greatest fear for my hens is cannibalism, aka egg eating. How do I avoid it?

An egg eater is a hen that opens eggs to eat them. Many hens will eat an egg that is already open but those don't worry me. It is the ones that purposely open eggs that are vile egg eaters. So try to clean up any broken or really soft shelled eggs that are easily broken before one learns to open eggs. This is the hard part.

Try to keep the eggs from breaking. Keep a nice layer of bedding in any nest. Check the nests so there are not any screw or nail heads or points sticking out that can puncture the eggs. Have enough of a lip on the nest so the eggs aren't easy to scratch out when they are arranging that bedding material.

Make sure you are feeding enough calcium for the eggshells to be hard. When the hens are getting on or off of the nests they walk on the eggs. If the eggshell is thin their claws can punch through and they may learn to open an egg from that.

The only time I had an egg eater (one that opened eggs) a pullet just starting to lay was laying eggs from the roost in the morning. That pullet had not yet learned enough control to wait until daylight so she could move to a nest. Some of those eggs broke when dropped from the roost. So that hen learned to open eggs to eat them. Others would join her in eating the opened eggs but never learned to open the eggs themselves.

 

[rosemarythyme]

Do I need a ball per box? I only have 3 golf balls.

I only use 1 ball per box because 1) it maybe slightly reduces the chance of a hen going broody (as opposed to a bunch of golf balls) and 2) because too many items rolling around in a nest box can cause breakage.