Oh, no! Egg eating!

[chickengeorgeto]

I have an egg eating epidemic... I filled an egg with siracha sauce. They loved it. At least it seemed like they did anyway. They are eating eggs from under my broody hens, and I'm losing a lot.

I am glad that you brought this up. My hens will gladly and eagerly eat the hottest peppers on the planet. Just because you or we like, or detest something is no guarantee that our chickens will share our human likes or dislikes. To put it another way, if your hens sleep on a tree limb, is that an indication that you will sleep well perched on a limb 30 feet off the ground?

 

[Tenrec]

Can vouch for the mustard trick. It doesn't take them long at all to figure that one out.

As for chickns liking hot foods, that's because, being birds, they are nto sensitive to capsaicin. They literally have no receptors for it, and thus they cannot sense hot spice.

 

[CuzChickens]

Can vouch for the mustard trick. It doesn't take them long at all to figure that one out.

As for chickns liking hot foods, that's because, being birds, they are nto sensitive to capsaicin. They literally have no receptors for it, and thus they cannot sense hot spice.

Interesting.....

I heard a bit of advice about that from a local farm supply store owner here. He said to pop a little hole in an egg, drain the inside out, then fill with either dish soap (like Dawn), or mustard. Apparently, hot sauce is a no-go because, as you've found out, they love it. So weird! I would have never thought that! So sorry you're having a problem.

I bought 4 nest eggs today, and I'm going to try mustard tomorrow.

That's extreme. I've never experienced that. Can you separate the broody hen from them?

I tried to separate my broody hens, but they flipped out and wouldn't go back to the eggs, so I put them back.

 

[FlyWheel]

I have ten hens (no Roos), they get 1 1/2 qts of Purina Flock Raiser (20% protein per the label, highest protein feed TSC has) that gets added to water and fermented for 48 hours (two casks on a rotating basis). They get fed this daily and gobble it all up within minutes. I think I am providing enough feed as this is actually more than I used to feed them when I was giving it to them dry, and they would usually have a little left over after 24 hours back then. They also have a can full of ground oyster and egg shell available at all time. They only started eating their eggs a week or so ago. All my ladies are at least 10 months old.

Their coop is 8' X 6', their run is 20' X 20'. Unfortunately I cannot free range them because the dogs would kill them without remorse. I have added ceramic eggs to their nest boxes, which often get kicked out of the nest boxes (smart hens!) and collect any real eggs four times daily; in the morning when I feed them, twice during the midday and when I clean out their poop trays in the evening (this used to be the only time a had to collect the eggs before they started eating them, and would usually come back with 6-9 a day).

None of them lay soft shelled eggs, in fact some of the EE's eggs are actually difficult to crack as they are at least twice as thick as store bought eggs. I have no idea who started this, but I'm afraid if it goes too long they may all pick up the habit.