How to get laying eggs in run to stop?

[Bear4boo]

Three of our chickens started laying a week ago. Two of them have been laying in the nesting boxes but one of them refuses to use the boxes: We find her eggs in the dust bath or on the ground in the run. I have picked her up and put her in the box to familiarize her with it and I do have ceramic eggs in the boxes. Any suggestions of what I can do to get her to use the nesting boxes?

 

[nuthatched]

Could they be sticking to her bum fluff and falling off later?

 

[Ilovemychicks08]

Three of our chickens started laying a week ago. Two of them have been laying in the nesting boxes but one of them refuses to use the boxes: We find her eggs in the dust bath or on the ground in the run. I have picked her up and put her in the box to familiarize her with it and I do have ceramic eggs in the boxes. Any suggestions of what I can do to get her to use the nesting boxes?

Take the eggs she lays and put them in the box and leave them in there if that doesn't helo maybe make a nesting box outside out of a bucket.

 

[Yardmom]

She is young and may figure it out on her own, but occasionally a bird may need to be locked in to reset where to lay. If she is not putting them in one spot in may just be a matter of waiting for her system to mature a bit.

 

[rosemarythyme]

Since she's young and new to this, it's possible it'll resolve itself soon without any need for you to "teach" her.

If she continues to lay outside of the nests, and the eggs aren't bloom heavy (where they may stick to her butt fluff and fall off away from the nest), you can try manually putting her in the box to show her how to use it, but timing is a little tricky.

Now this isn't practical if you don't have time to stalk them, but what I did was I learned the problem bird(s) laying schedules, and when they went to their preferred spot to lay, I'd go and pick them up, stick them in a nest box, and barricade them in using my arms to cover the exit. 30-60 seconds was all they needed to calm down and start exploring the box and decide that maybe it wasn't such a bad place to be. They each started reliably using the boxes after that.

Alternatively, some folks design "doors" on their nest boxes so birds can be locked in, which basically does the same as above, but forces the bird to stay in the nest box (whereas once I see them exploring and sitting down in the nest, I leave them to it and walk away).