Not using nesting boxes

[banjomoon]

I have a small flock of 6 birds in a tractor coop. They range in our yard during the day. In the hen house there were nesting boxes.

The first hen started laying but instead of the nesting area, she just laid in a corner hunkered down in the pine shavings in the hen house.

I made new nesting boxes out of 5 gallon buckets in the corner she likes. She just laid somewhere else!

I used the Easter eggs and I thought perhaps the next hen would use the nesting boxes. Nope, same thing. Seems they just consider the entire upstairs hen house as a nesting box.

I don't really mind, but I'm worried about what happens when they go broody. I don't want them to get pooped on from the roosting bar above. Could I just put the broody hens in the nest boxes once they go broody? Should I try to get them to use the boxes? I even put one of their eggs in the nesting boxes and that didn't work.

 

[ChirpyChicks1]

I had better luck using golf balls over using Easter eggs

Guess my flock didn't approve of the spring colors. Some chickens just don't use nesting boxes, I've seen quite a few people mention that their chickens just make their own nests in the coop bedding. It also seems like my chickens did better when the nesting box had straw while the coop bedding was shavings