Mystery in the henhouse...where the my broodies eggs go????

[nuttyredhead]

Augh...i thought i posted this but ooops.... so here goes again!

Im missing 2 of my broodies eggs. Gone, simply gone. (this is the D'uccle that i posted pics of yesterday, jinxed myself!). She had 5 eggs last night/ I went out this morning and she was only sitting on 4 eggs.....this afternoon I went out. On first glance no eggs in the nest (and it is a mess), broody is in the next nest over sitting on nothing. One egg is on the floor in front of the nest. After looking through the mess in the nest i found 2 more eggs buried under shavings. I raked through the coop and nothing. No shells nothing.

Then I got to thinking, the oyster shells were empty....so i refilled it. 2 of my girls went at it like it was a treat. Is this a coincidence? Or were they lacking the calcium and ate the eggs, shells n all???

And if they ate the eggs, they were on day 11. Will they get sick? Will there eggs be contaminated????

 

[NonnasBabies]

The only thing I can tell you is my broody ate a egg where the chick had zipped and you could see it but at some point after that it died. That was on day 23 after all the other eggs hatched. It didn't make her sick and I was told it was normal!!

 

[dandelionheart]

I'm guessing that for whatever reason she decided to move the eggs... and maybe some dropped, which of course often means they broke. Once broken... well, they get eaten.

So I'd try and give them treats out the wazoo and maybe they will forget (hopefully) about their surprise treat. I wouldn't worry about contamination... I would worry about future egg eating.

If those other eggs didn't break, I'd try and put them back under her.

 

[mulewagon]

Could be snakes...they'll steal the eggs out from under a hen. I once had a hen start with thirteen eggs - after about six chicks hatched, I checked for the others, and there wasn't a sign of them! We have some big chicken snakes around here, I once chased one until it spat the egg back up at me!

 

[newchickens2009]

Maybe mother hen ate them because they were not developing properly or not at all? I know this sounds gross but I have a hen that does this everytime she hatches. She eats the shell and all without leaving a single trace. The first few times I thought that someone or something was taking them so I put her in a coop where nothing could get in and she did the same thing. She also never leaves any shell after all the rest have hatched, she eats ever peace to clean the nest I guess. Talked to an old island farmer here and he says that they do it so the rotton egg doesn't explode and ruin the rest and at the end of hatching so there is no gearms for the chicks to eat and get sick. Now who said that chickens are stupid?
All I can say is "WOW" what a wonderfull God we serve and how awazing He is to create such smart chickens!

 

[Sir Birdaholic]

Quote:
Probably no snakes out in January in N.H., unless it's the rare, "Snowsnake".

 

[chicks4kids]

I also agree that she might have just ditched the eggs. I've had a broody do this as well to eggs that were not developing...simply just pop them out of her nest.

 

[mulewagon]

Quote:
Probably no snakes out in January in N.H., unless it's the rare, "Snowsnake".

Oh, yeah - that's what I get for posting without enough sleep! Seasons? What seasons?

(It's 64 here, we have to watch for the darn things!)