Nebraskans Speak Up!!! NEBRASKA ROCKS!!

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3HensandaRoo said:
Mine slept in the nesting boxes right up until they started laying. I tried blocking them off, but they kept breaking through my barrier! Now they lay eggs in the nesting boxes (for the most part) and sleep in the roost!
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Good to know!

I've got the boxes blocked with 3/8 plywood screwed to the tractor frame ...... unless one or more of them turns into the Bionic Chicken, or they can summon The Kool-Aid Man somehow, that isn't going to get broken through.....
 
Mine roosted on their own just fine (I'm pretty sure... I rarely check on them after sundown), but my first two eggs (plus the yolk I got first) were on the floor of the coop. I put the golf balls in a few of the nesting boxes and egg #3 and 4 were both in nesting boxes, but not the ones with golf balls, so I'm not really sure if it's working or not. I usually let them free range all day, but lately I've been keeping them cooped up so I can try to limit laying to the coop and nesting boxes. Yesterday I started construction on my new coop for my new house and this one is going to have a run so it'll be nice to have that option for egg containment (if nothing else).
 
Do your hens free range? I found my white rock had a little nest going in some tall grass about 15 feet from our coop with 4 or 5 eggs in it. Locked them in the coop for a day and forced them to lay in there and they've seemed to get the hint that eggs go in the nesting boxes.
 
Husker Hens said:
Do your hens free range?
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Only if I get home at decent hour in the evening and have time for some "Chicken Therapy"...... I let them out and move the tractor, clean under the roosts ...... and sip on a nice small batch bourbon while leaning on a hoe..... it's really relaxing ...... knowing that for the next hour or so, the only responsibility I have is to ensure that those 9 hens stay in my yard....... they spend their hour or so grazing ferociusly...... apparently, the "grass is always greener on the other side of the wire" ...... no chance they are laying anywhere else...... could they be eating them? I got home early today, went out and checked the nest boxes.... found an egg, still warm ......

They have plenty of food, both layer pellets and apples and cucumbers .....and whatever leftovers we did not eat ( 2 pounds of cooked fish the other day, a similar amount of chicken and noodles this AM ....... I dunno....... I got them as 3 day old chicks mid-may ......
 
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