predator? or do chickens move eggs themselves?!

[YolandaT]

i! I have 4 chickens about 7mths old. My chickens don't use any of their roosts and they don't lay in their nest box so I know they're kind of weird.

Well the other day we saw an egg in the run. It was sort of hard to get to so we closed the chickens up in the coop and thought to get the egg later. My husband opened the coop in the AM and forgot to get the egg. When he remembered, in early afternoon, the egg had moved from the run into the middle of their coop!! Do chickens move eggs?!

The weird thing is, they have to jump down about 4 inches from the coop to the run - so to get it into the coop from the run means they would have had to lift the egg up into the opening. Is this possible? If a chicken didn't do it....what do you think did? We have checked and the coop nor the run have any spaces for anything to get in.

What is going on?! Egg production has been low and I attributed it to winter but now I'm wondering if there is something else afoot. What do you think?

 

[BirdBrain]

Your chickens moved it. Mine are forever stealing the golf balls out of the other nests and putting them in the preferred box. What they do is use their beak to draw the egg up under their wing. Then they walk to where they want and gently put it down. It is the weirdest thing.

 

[coltssuperbowl83]

Do they really move eggs like that?? That is awesome!

 

[YolandaT]

Awww I had no idea they could do that!! So funny. Thank you!!

 

[startingover]

I always wondered if they could indeed move eggs.... Had eggs move several times and never asked anyone if they had witnessed it... interesting...