One large open nest vs. Individual Nest

[babyrnlc]

I am new here too. I am also very new to chickens. My mother and i built our coop and we made a large nest box on either side (the size of two nest boxes each). We decided not to put a divider in the nest boxes.

We only have two hens (we are waiting on some eggs to hatch that we are going to keep 4 or 6, we are in the city so we cannot have more than that).

So the girls have access to either box that is about 30 inches wide. They both lay in the same box., they took the hay and made two nests in the box. They lay at different times though. One lays around 10 am and the other around 1 pm (which seem odd to me, but it has been that way the whole week)

 

[CathyM]

Quote:
I'm probably doing something wrong, but I built two nest boxes (for four hens) and they only use one (and yes, they fight over it)... and for the second "coopette", I got tired and didn't put in a box, and the two hens use a corner of the coop floor... and now the other hens are "slumming" and stealing in to use the smaller coopette to lay, whenever they can get into that area!

Something about no box nest seems to attract them... unless they are just trying to piss off the other birds!

 

[spiritdance]

Try putting one or two smooth roundish rocks in the unused nest. Hens seem to like what other hens like, so if they think someone else is laying in there, they might give it a try.