LAYING EGGS FROM THE ROOST!

[noodleandpoodle]

Just brought home 4 new chooks about 20 weeks old. We have had a couple of eggs laid in the garden and one chook who has laid three days in a row from the roost! The nest boxes are all set but they haven't got the idea yet.

How do i get them to use the nesting boxes and also to stop them laying from '6 foot high?

 

[Poulets De Cajun]

Find some false eggs and put them in the nest boxes. You might also try taking the roost out for a few days.

 

[SoJoChickens]

I agree with PouletsDeCajun; try using fake eggs in the nests. If the nests are high off the ground, you could also try lowering them until the hens get used to them.

 

[lalaland]

I've seen that behavior with new layers - kind of wonder whether they don't quite yet know that they are about to lay an egg! fake eggs do seem to help - they will probably get the idea in a couple of days or so. in the meantime, make sure your are under the roosts is soft - throw some hay or wood shavings there so the dropped egg doesn't crack.

 

[Jolly Acres]

another vote for fake eggs.

Last summer my chickens were laying outside the coop.
I put some fake eggs in the nesting boxes, next day they all laid in the nesting box and have been doing so since.

Good Luck!

 

[CovenantCreek]

Mine aren't new layers, but even they occasionally have an egg drop from the roost. To encourage new layers to use the nest boxes, use fake eggs (or golf balls) to "seed" the nests. When the girls realize that those eggs don't disappear they should start to think of the boxes as the safest place to leave their own eggs.

As for the eggs dropping from the roosts, I try to set the light to come on early enough to make sure the girls are awake before they lay. In one coop, I think the red heat lamp kept one of the hens from sleeping well so she started laying in the middle of the night -- then the first night that it was warm enough for the heat lamp not to come on there was an egg on the floor instead of in the nest. Guess she finally got a good night's sleep.

 

[blueseal]

i have a couple hens that are laying from the roost also every 2 or three days i go out in the morning and theres a egg underneath the roost either frozen or broke. havent found wich one is doing it yet. just this morning i found atiny small weird shaped egg almost looked like apinky finger but alittle chubier round must be one of the nh. reds just starting too lay .

 

[Goldie56]

only 2 of my girls are laying as yet and I put in a table tennis ball (same colour as eggs actually) and they toss the ball out before they lay their own egg. Not silly, my girls!

 

[phalenbeck]

After laying (dropping) thin shell eggs from the roost, then in misc. places my EE now is using the smallest box. I think and hope she was just figuring it out. She is my only supposed good producer, the others are 'decorative'. I told her she looked tasty, so she better give some production going in the right place. Maybe your chickens need the 'tasty fresh or frozen speech'.

 

[PortageGirl]

Heavier wooden fake eggs or 'real' golf balls seem to work best. Chickens may be bird-brains but they do seem to know the light-weight plastic easter eggs or ping-pong balls aren't right!! I suppose maybe the fake eggs aren't quite right either, but they're similar enough to a actual egg that they seem to at least give them the idea of where the nest might be and where they should maybe put some more.