Not impressed with shell strength.

[MissE]

There's more to egg shell quality than just calcium. Amino acids play a role too, as does the age of the hen. A high quality supplement added to their water such as Chick Booster by Neurovet offers a complete vitamin, mineral and amino-acid profile for poultry and is easy to administer, cheap and pleasantly flavored. While at your feed store, check to see if they have some.

I do have Nutri-Drench that I give them once a month. I could increase that to once a week. They dive bomb the waterer when I put it in there, so they must like it.

 

[RoosterML]

Mix the 2 feeds together 50/50. Along with oyster shell on the side.

 

[MissE]

What you could try, if you're willing to buy more than 1 type of feed, is to offer both layer and starter/all flock. It'll dilute down the calcium a bit and up the protein a bit, which I feel better about. My birds get fermented grower as well as dry layer pellets - most of them prefer to fill up on the grower and then nibble on the layer the rest of the day. Oyster shells are available. Egg shells are pretty good, though I do have one bird that doesn't want oyster shell, so when she's laying I mix some oyster shell powder into her private breakfast as she does need more calcium.

I have two feeders. I could do one with layer, which is pellet form, and one with starter/grower, which is a crumble, in the other. When I was transitioning them over, I mixed the two together, and there was a lot of feed that got picked over and ended up on the floor.

 

[MissE]

Mix the 2 feeds together 50/50. Along with oyster shell on the side.

Unfortunately they don't come in the same form, and they make a mess picking out what they want, but I could use separate feeders and let them choose.

 

[RoosterML]

Unfortunately they don't come in the same form, and they make a mess picking out what they want, but I could use separate feeders and let them choose.

Mixing pellets and crumbles isn’t an issue

 

[MissE]

Mixing pellets and crumbles isn’t an issue

It is when they pick through it and throw the pellets out of the feeder trying to get to the crumbles.

 

[RoosterML]

Your starter is a crumbles you can also get a layer crumbles. Not sure what the issue is.

 

[MissE]

Your starter is a crumbles you can also get a layer crumbles. Not sure what the issue is.

The issue is I cannot get layer crumbles, only layer pellets. Not everyone lives in an area where they have access to every type of feed under the sun.

 

[aart]

and I think the two that broke while I was cleaning them came from the same ISA brown.

How old is she?
If most your eggs are fine, then it may just be one or two bird problem.
So pilling those couple-few birds might be the first thing to try.
Might try crushing your egg shells and mixing with the oyster shell.

 

[MissE]

How old is she?
If most your eggs are fine, then it may just be one or two bird problem.
So pilling those couple-few birds might be the first thing to try.
Might try crushing your egg shells and mixing with the oyster shell.

She was hatched March of 2019, so she's 24 month, and lays about six eggs a week.

Adding the egg shells to the oyster shells might get them to eat more of the OS. Right now I just toss the ES in the run, and it's like watching a goldfish get dropped into a piranha tank. They are gone in seconds.