How do you feed egg shells back to chickens

[marcym]

I bake for a living, so my girls get lots of shells fed back to them. I break them into my bowl, toss the shells into my "slop" busket, and dump them in the pen. No need for all the extra steps.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

I learned to microwave them here on BYC. What a convenience it is to throw shells in for 3 minutes to cook clean then hold until we have enough to roller pin crush. We mix our crushed shells right into the layer feed.

No molding or smell from when I tried to hold long enough to make it worth baking then crushing.

 

[countrychick14]

I am going to start giving it to them.

 

[poodlepill]

Thanks all for the suggestions. I took my crunched up shells and they loved them, I was really amazed how they really went after them. I was feeding the Layena layer pellets but since I am combining a pullet flock with my big girls I pulled the layer feed and giving them all the grower/meat bird mix with some oyster shell/egg shell on the side.

 

[lotzahenz]

I always bake them at 200 deg. for about 20 to 30 minutes to kill any bacteria on them, then they easily crush and I add them to their feed.

 

[greyhorsewoman]

You don't HAVE to do anything to your egg shells before you give them to your hens. You CAN do all kinds of things, but nothing is really necessary. I've been feeding back my eggshells to my chickens for YEARS without incidence (including creating egg eaters).

 

[Noymira]

Good thread! I have a bowl I've been saving our egg shells in a bowl (we only started getting eggs last week), but haven't fed them back yet because I also wasn't sure how! I've rinsed them well and let them dry. I think I'll try the rolling pin trick.

We will be switching to flock raiser once we get our chicks in the big coop with our hens and I'd love to not have to buy oyster shells and instead offer the egg shells on the side.

 

[Indy acres]

I have one of those little electric choppers or food processor and after my egg shells have been washed I put them in the window to dry then I throw them in that little chopper and it grinds them up real fine and my girls egg shells are nice and thick!! You can get a little chopper for $9.00 at the dollar store and sometimes even cheaper it works perfect!!!!

 

[Indy acres]

I have been doing this for a year now and I just take and mix it in with their food and it seems to be working real good. I haven't had to buy oyster shells since I started!

 

[luvmesomechicks]

I would have thought that they would turn into egg eaters especially after the fact that there was an incident in which they had a feast with a basket of 4-5 eggs that was set down. Would feeding them the shells after this incident turn them into egg eaters?