Picture of huge thin shelled eggs

[Mskayladog]

Thinning eggshells usually indicate the bird has an infection.

I don't believe that is correct, soft shells or usually a sign of calcium deficiency. When I see a thin shell I toss some oyster shell in the coop and some crushed up egg shell solves the problem for me.

 

[Mtn Laurel]

Do you have any idea how old she is or how long she's been laying? My girls laid all sorts of thin shelled, "rubber" shelled, and no-shelled eggs when they first began laying. Took them a few weeks to figure it out but now they're laying fine.

 

[Texas Granny]

Thinning eggshells is a symptom of infection. And it's contageous which means since the bird has not been kept in isolation, the entire flock could become sick. I never put new birds, even chicks, in with my established flock until after they have been in isolation 30 days. A lot of people say 2 weeks of isolation is plenty, but I have sadly discovered this is not true. Also, twice a year I routinely add antibiotic to all the animals water for two weeks or switch the feed to antiobiotic crumbles. This is done when Summer goes to Fall/Winter and again when Winter goes to Spring. You cannot eat the eggs during the antibiotic threatment and wait one week after treatment to use the eggs again. Wild birds will come down and eat/drink water with your chickens, those two particular times of the year are when wild birds tend to get and spread infections and can make your birds sick. In fact, you can easily loose your entire flock. We also wash all watering vessels every day and replenish with fresh clean water. When you have a lot of birds drinking out of one vessel, bacteria from their mouths will contaminate the water supply. If you have rabbits, the rabbits are treated along with the birds. Chicken diseases can and do cross over to rabbits and when they do, you cannot eat the rabbit meat or it will make you sick. I hope this helps. We learned the hard way to check all our stock everyday for diseases and take action immediately and don't raise rabbits and chickens together in the same area or allow chickens to roost on cages or peck around under cages. Best of luck to you.

 

[Texas Granny]

Yes, actually it is a symptom of a highly contageous disease in birds and can spread to rabbits as well. Back in the old days, the issue was addressed with adding calcium but now we know disease is the issue. There was no treatment in the old days, now there is.

 

[Smoochie]

Soft large eggs are not that uncommon in old hens. Also, Stress and excitement can also cause the egg to expel before the shell is finished. It could be a virus.. I would just keep her isolated until you know for sure.

 

[Im Barred up]

I guess the thing is that she doesn't appear diseased in any way. Very healthy active bird who is around 15 months old. None of the other hens (7 in total) seem to be catching it either. I've tried to make her eat oyster shell, but she doesn't seem interested in it. I thought about putting a few crumbs in with a piece of bread to see if it actually is a calcium defiency, but I don't know if that's wise or not either. The biggest thing is (and maybe the original picture doesn't show it well) that they are huge eggs. I'll try another picture. The Barred Rock egg on the left I would consider normal Large, the middle egg is one of the Redstar's Jumbo, and the last one is my other Redstar's super jumbo thin shell.

 

[Mtn Laurel]

If she's not taking the oyster shell - and my girls don't like oyster shell, either - crumble up the shells of the birds who are laying solid eggs and give them back to them. Also give her yogurt and cottage cheese as a way to up her calcium intake and see if that helps.

 

[Im Barred up]

I tried crushing up egg shells and feeding it to her, but she doesn't want to have nothing to do with them either. She laid an egg later this afternoon and it;s the first one I would consider soft shell...almost balloon like and made a mess in the nesting box. Unfortunately I think where tomorrow is Saturday I may have to put her down. I don't have any place to isolate her to keep her in the darkness to give her body a break, and just in case it is a disease (although I don't think it is) I want to make sure it doesn't spread.

 

[Crafty-Duck]

If you adopted them recently it could be stress and may take some time to get used to things (just a thought).

 

[sumi]

Post #7:

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/663464/what-causes-soft-shell-eggs

Also look here:

http://www.blpbooks.co.uk/articles/egg_problems/egg_problems.php