Should all the nesting boxes be higher then the floor? I have two at ground level and then I had put a tin bowl on top and they all seem to use the tin and never the nesting boxes. Should I move the boxes higher? If I do how high off the ground should it be?
I have some open top ones on the floor and some more standard ones on the wall. Some chickens prefer one type, some the other. Floor ones are great to have for a hen who has hatched chicks, though. So glad my broody likes one of the floor nests.
I have 4 nests that are about 30 inches off the floor and two nests that are about 3 inches off the floor. My chickens NEVER use the nests close to the floor. they will wait in line, and sometimes I'll find two in the nest at one time in the ones that I have higher.
I have 12 nest boxes. They were actually old "parts" bins in the barn. They are stacked in 3 rows. All 4 bottom boxes get used, the far left middle gets used and the top 2 ends get used. I wasn't going to make the top boxes as nests because they are supposed to be lower than the roosts, but and old chicken lady friend told me to get them fixed up. She was right. They have their choice.
My nest boxes aren't even in the coop. They are at a height I don't have to stoop to see in. I do have nesting "caves" in the coop on the raised floor, however, but they don't get much use.
Greg read some book or other about chickens and somewhere in there it said to have the nesting boxes 12 inches off the floor. By golly, he measured to make sure it was exactly 12 inches. The old girls used the two middle boxes religiously. Then we enlarged the house so it's now almost like two houses connected by a door. The NEW girlies never use the nesting boxes. They prefer a little cave they've made out of old straw bales and they'll wait in line to get in there.
I don' t think the hens have a preference. They will lay were they are "trained" or feel safe for themselves and their eggs. Mine start at 30 inches off the floor and this is really more for my benefit then anything else, prevents me from having to stoop over to collect eggs. I have an old kitchen cabinet that I use to use for storing things but dust stopped that so I took the doors off put in a ledge and thought I would see if they would lay in it. By golly some of my hens do and the first nest is about 5 1/2 feet off the ground.
