Perfect nesting material

[Beer can]

They do like a bowl. I've found that even if the bottom of bowl is bare,
the soft sides of bowl catch the egg as it falls and it rolls down to bottom without breakage. I shove a good flake of straw tight in nest then bowl it out a bit, it stays together pretty good most the time.

I made 'bale bags' out of feed bags to hold bales of straw and hay from getting scattered all over my storage area after cutting the strings. A couple feed bags opened flat and sewn together offered just enough material to closely fit a whole bale, they've really worked out great.

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I store sawdust from cutting firewood the same way Lol!

 

[Beer can]

I'd like to switch to roll out nest boxes for cleaner eggs when it's muddy (started building some but didn't get very far...) and use green outdoors carpet in the boxes.
Every time I've used hay, straw, grass clippings, dry tree leaves, they seem to kick it all out eventually even with a board holding it in.
Sawdust, wood chips or shavings have worked the best for me, and yup still make a nest to the bare bottom but most of it stays in. When I gather eggs I spread it back out, next day bare bottom again Lol. No broken eggs though.

 

[FlyWheel]

One advantage a folded feed bag has over any other type of bedding (even if used in conjuction) is cleaning the nest box after an egg is broken.

HA! Whenever one of my hens finds a broken egg they clean it up...shell and all!

 

[CapricornFarm]

HA! Whenever one of my hens finds a broken egg they clean it up...shell and all!

You don't want them getting used to eating eggs!

 

[Areemas]

Thanks for all the great suggestions. It's very helpful to hear what others do.

 

[rosemarythyme]

It is just a matter of time.
Even if one supplies oyster shells continually as hens age the ability to produce hard egg shells decreases.

Well I meant in relation to not having any sort of padding in the nest box... before I saw your tip on using feed bags , I did have some eggs crack from rolling around on the hard wooden bottom of the box.

And yes my birds are still young so the egg quality is still good.