Please don't tell me to "do a search" because I have!

[RL]

Wow I must have some really well mannered clean chickens. I use wood shavings in my nest boxes with a 4” lip on the front of them. I never had to teach them to use the boxes, never had to put fake eggs or anything in them. Well I guess I did have to teach the first one to lay in the boxes. She laid her first egg on the roost so I put a tote on the roost and she laid in that for two days and then I put the tote in the nest box and she laid in the tote in the nest box for two days and then I removed the tote and from then on she has laid in the nest boxes, she has her favorite one now that she always lays in. Anyway, the others all just went right to boxes to lay; trying out every one of them each day. They have never kicked out any of the shavings or even pooped in them. The only time I get a dirty egg is when it is has been raining a lot and the girls track mud into boxes.
I wonder if it is way your boxes are setup. Are they open toped or are they enclosed? Mine are about 13x13x15 with a few larger and they are enclosed with just a front opening. Maybe your boxes are too open and they just seem to be a place to play.

 

[tdgill]

I noticed my hens doing alot of scratching in the nest box before they started laying. It was like they were trying to get comfortable. Slow motion, tail up in the air like they were gonna pop an egg out. Then after all was scattered about they'd hop out of the box but no egg. Sounds like yours are practising but don't have it figured out yet. But sounds like they're getting closer to laying! Now that mine have been laying they dont do that slow motion scratching anymore. They just hop in and settle down to lay. Sometimes they will peck at the straw and place it around themselves while they are sitting.

 

[henmommy]

I use wood shavings and easter eggs. They just knew to lay in the boxes. My problem now is that my fat BO's sleep in the boxes since they are to fat to fly up to the roost. I have to change the shavings often.

 

[coop's chicks]

I use wood chips. I put hay in a couple boxes just because I'm new at this and wondered what they preferred. They seem to like the wood chips a lot better and, unlike the other posters, they don't seem to kick them out. One of the hens today, though, was kicking out the hay!! Try wood.

 

[1birdlady]

Just chiming in with our experience....we use wood shavings, and had a fake plastic egg in there to begin with, when they were about 20 weeks old.

Some time after that, (a few weeks, IIRC) the first hen laid her egg, and what a beauty it was! LOL!

We have found that they like the wood shavings, but kick most of it around and out (we use a small vari kennel as nest box), and more often than not, they lay on the bare plastic floor of the kennel. Not a problem at all, and I expected they would crack their eggs laying like that...go figger!

Edit to add, we have 4 Barred Rocks.

 

[Pampered Hen]

When my first hens started laying they also kicked all the shavings out. I first thought that my design was poor with such a low lip. I learned they do less scratching when they find the nestbox to their liking. They kinda like a depression where they can settle in to do their laying duties. I just overstuffed the nest box with straw or hey or even moss from the garden and sort of tampered in down a bit and shaped it into what I thought might be considered a nest from the chicken perspective. I do use fake eggs in the nests and that also seem to convince the girls that the nest is just right. My young pullets from this year who are just beginning to lay do scratch some, but they will settle down once they get into the routine.

 

[SurprisingWoman]

I tried using hay but they kicked it out and it glumped (is that a word?) on the bottom of the coop and got all wet and gross. (I use the DLM)

I started using wood chips like I do for the DLM and under it all I have a piece of egg crate foam like people put on mattresses.

 

[ivan3]

RL wrote: Wow I must have some really well mannered clean chickens. I use wood shavings in my nest boxes with a 4” lip on the front of them. I never had to teach them to use the boxes, never had to put fake eggs or anything in them. Well I guess I did have to teach the first one to lay in the boxes. She laid her first egg on the roost so I put a tote on the roost and she laid in that for two days and then I put the tote in the nest box and she laid in the tote in the nest box for two days and then I removed the tote and from then on she has laid in the nest boxes, she has her favorite one now that she always lays in.

Yep, there it is. Can't outscratch `em so it is best to hornswoggle them. Getting an accurate count in a hurry might well require phase conjugate lasers and a spray-on reflective, but the straw-to-the-whirlwind debris fields can be limited by design (lips are good).

Variations on another method (some with straw guards): https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=69355&p=2

Search for anything short of a miracle and it will turn up, refine your terms further and who knows?​

 

[Chickie'sMoma]

wood shaving have been working for me too. i used the shredded paper that my sister had left over from a previous pet they lost. but my girls seemed to dis-like it so much they threw it out of the 4 boxes they got to choose from.

my ladies didn't start laying until they hit about 25-26 weeks old. so you may have to wait a little longer before they should interest in the boxes. the fake eggs also worked to get them in there.

 

[gritsar]

I've always been real generous with the hay in my nestboxes, as in stuffed so much in there they'd break a leg trying to scratch it out. Never had a problem with them kicking out more than a stalk or two.
Now I have all brand new covered nestboxes. The only way the hay is coming out of those babies is #1. I remove it, which I do once a week or #2. They stand outside the box and tug it out. As lazy as my hens are, that ain't happening in this lifetime.
They like their little hay nests.
When I put a fresh clump of hay in, I make a depression in the center with my hands and drop the golfballs into the depression. Simple as can be.