Poor Egg Condition

[BobsRanchita]

Well. I can chock this up to not having a rooster in the past. If you have a rooster make sure your eggs are collected EVERY day. It only takes for days for a baby to develop to the point it has eye spots.

 

[KristHen]

Who collects the eggs? Are they shaking them?

 

[K C]

Following this thread for educational purposes and the hope of help. I have an approximately one year old bantam Phoenix hen that has had soft-shelled eggs lately. Now at day 12 for calcium+D3 and had another bad egg today (so far someone is eating the faulty eggs and I find the shells, or part of them, on the ground early mornings). Ordered Redmonds Agriculture Conditioner (minerals) that will arrive soon. Hoping it's simply some kind of deficiency that can be eliminated by adding that to their feed. They are on organic layer crumble, free choice oyster shells and a separate free choice grit plus some organic scratch daily. A couple of the older girls (four years) have also had shell issues, but responded positively to the calcium+D3 even though they don't necessarily lay as often at this point. I'm baffled. I posted separately about this around a week ago and someone posted that they'd tag an educator, but they never responded. I'd appreciate help/suggestions as well. I didn't expect such a young hen to have shell quality issues. She acts normal otherwise.

 

[LaFleche]

plus some organic scratch daily.

I would stop the scratch to see if the shell issues improve by just feeding them the layer crumbles.

If you see much residues/leftovers in form of dust, you can use it for mash just adding a bit of water or greek yoghurt so they will get all the nutrients.

Vitamin C can also help with forming better egg shells.

 

[scoretzm]

We have been giving our hens (no roosters) 17% layer pellets, we switched to pellets from crumble when they started laying eggs, now that the eggs have been dropping off, and the hens are almost a year and a half, we will start switching to 18% (all non-GMO) layer pellets. They have access to a mixture of crushed egg and oyster shells, a large dust bath, plenty of water and small bits of gravel for digestion. In the afternoon we open up another yard that is all grass for their grazing pleasure; but we still be get some wonky looking wrinkly eggs and some thinner shelled eggs too. We still try to think of ways to help the hens produce better looking eggs (because we sell ours); but sometimes I think it's a crapshoot. The only upside is we keep all the weird looking eggs and eat them ourselves. Sorry I couldn't be more helpful.