recycling the shells

[KattyKillFish]

i wash mine good, let 'em dry and crush them really tiny. i use a morter & pestle. then give 'em the treats!

 

[melissastraka]

I also bake mine and then use my food processor to get them little enough. They love it and it is so much better then spending money on oyster shell though I make my own of that too.

 

[Sunny Side Up]

It all depends on how much you care to fuss over the process. You don't have to wash & dry them, only if you're storing up a lot on your counter for a long period of time. Chickens don't have a sense of smell, and they shouldn't make the connection between crushed shells & their own e g g s. You don't have to bake or microwave them either, but I find it makes it so much easier to crumble them. Whenever I make a dish that uses a lot of e g g s, like quiche or french toast, I save all the shells to return to the chickens. I bake them in a pie pan and crush them with a flat-bottomed coffee mug.

 

[Kim_NC]

I rinse them out, dry them in the oven in a cake or pie pan (mostly to kill bacteria, LOL or because it makes me feel better), then crush them in my hands to 1/4" pieces.

 

[Jetlander]

Quote:
Do you go out and collect oyster shells? If not how do you make them?

 

[melissastraka]

I am fortunate enough to live on the coast of WA and i have friends that run a seafood shack around the bend from us. Collecting oyster shells from a local beach is a very large fine since new oysters can grow from the shells. I got lucky. They clean them and break them into small enough pieces for me to fit into bags. I then take a sledge hammer (i know i am redneck) and break them into small pieces. In the end it is labor instead of money. I also do it with clam shells after a dig. Those i bake because they hold a lot of water. I use a hammer for that also because the oyster and clam shells are harder then eggs and would hate to ruin my food processor.

 

[Cetawin]

For me it depends...if it is only a few I wash them and let them dry then crush them with a mortar and pestle if there are a lot of them I toss them in a low temp over for about 20 minutes and break them up.

The girls love them and I have never had an egg eater.

I also toss some in my compost pile and turn them in.