Silly nesting behavior

[Killer Tomato]

Theres a really good Silkie breeder nearby who has eggs, and I've been drooling over her fancy birds, so I'm ready! The thought of not having to brood chicks myself, in my bathroom, in winter/spring this year, sounds great to me!

 

[Shadrach]

This may simply be entertaining for you but if anyone has any ideas I'm all ears. My five April 2018 girls started laying this fall and are really pretty consistent about it. At first one preferred a spot in the hayloft - I finally found it and was collecting from up there but then she stopped laying there. I think mostly they lay in their nest box - the one the older girls (who are now all gone - old age) preferred. They have a total of 4 places in their big coop they can lay but one is a serious favorite.

Last Friday I realized I'd only gotten 2 eggs for 2 days. Hmmm. What's up - getting dark? Someone found a new spot?

Saturday morning I see one of them sitting in a sunny corner spot outside where the barn meets the ellway. Lots of leaves to sit in. And when she gets up and starts telling the world about her accomplishments I find 8 eggs there!!

Then I see two of the others sitting there throughout the day and picked up 2 more eggs. On Sunday you would have thought I'd caused the sun to rise in the North. There was great consternation that the outside nest was found - stomping around, chattering at me, going into their coop (a big horse stall in the barn) and making a huge production of scratching in one of the lesser used nests. But only 2 eggs on Sunday.

Today I kept them inside until noontime and there were 3 eggs there. I don't know what I'll find when I get home- one definitely is an afternoon layer.

I'm just surprised at how mad they were that their outside nest had been discovered - and why would they have started laying outside in December when it's super cold?

Since I know they all can lay inside - I've found 5 eggs on most days - why do they decide to find a new spot?

The notion that hens prefer dark secluded spots often in dark coops is erroneous in my experience.
Firstly there are a number of papers that suggest eggs need a certain amount of daylight to produce healthy chicks.
The hens ancestors layed, sat, and hatched on the ground where they could create a hollow in which to lay the clutch. The hollow is important because it allows them to control the orientation of the eggs without the eggs rolling away. It is also important because it allows the hen to sit on top of the eggs rather than try to surround her body with them and cover them with her wings.
The vast majority of the pullets here will choose to lay outside rather than in a coop. They can be ‘trained’ to lay in the nest boxes we build for them but most are far from ideal in the eyes of the hen.
What often is the deciding factor is where the hen feels safe.

 

[Killer Tomato]

The notion that hens prefer dark secluded spots often in dark coops is erroneous in my experience.
Firstly there are a number of papers that suggest eggs need a certain amount of daylight to produce healthy chicks.
The hens ancestors layed, sat, and hatched on the ground where they could create a hollow in which to lay the clutch. The hollow is important because it allows them to control the orientation of the eggs without the eggs rolling away. It is also important because it allows the hen to sit on top of the eggs rather than try to surround her body with them and cover them with her wings.
The vast majority of the pullets here will choose to lay outside rather than in a coop. They can be ‘trained’ to lay in the nest boxes we build for them but most are far from ideal in the eyes of the hen.
What often is the deciding factor is where the hen feels safe.

It seems that my hens prefer dark, secluded spots both inside, and outside the coop!

 

[chickengeorgeto]

I’ve noticed that whenever I took all the eggs, they would choose other places to lay them. Now I leave a few eggs in the area if I like where they are laying.

That is why I so dislike the term "CHICKEN MATH" In a nut shell chickens can't do math worth a hoot. Any hen who hatches out 18 healthy baby chicks is very very happy with her accomplishment as long as just one of those chicks is still with the living. The same thing is true with eggs, as long as one or two eggs remain in the nest the hen is unable to differentiate between one egg and one dozen eggs, or even one gross of eggs for that matter. Lets just say that hens are very poor at math and leave it at that.

Outside of morphine there is nothing more calming than a old cluck dragging a clutch of young peeps around your yard. Hens are nerves prey animals regardless of all the wee animals that they consume and as prey animals hens, (Especially the ones that most closely resemble wild chickens or the free range chickens of old) have a healthy respect for things that go BUMP in the night and that also have a mouth full of sharp fangs. The better to rip your body apart don't you know. So hens do tend to lay in secluded places. I once had a hen who sole her nest beneath the hood of a C30 Chevy truck that was being used for backup. When I decided to drive it to town one day to keep the battery charged the old hen de-camped while I was waiting in line at the drive-in-teller window.
Maybe the heat of the idling engine got to her, I don't know. The nice girls who worked for that bank kept their eyes peeled for my hen and she soon had a new nest next to some shrubs at the bank. Once she went back to sitting I showed up after dark with a tow sack and soon had her back home.

 

[chickengeorgeto]

It is true that hens prefer to have some light in or over the nest but the amount of light is only intended to allow the developing chicken fetus to orient itself. The reason that hens turn their eggs on average 100 times per day is to keep the developing chick in motion inside the eggs membrane. If the eggs are not turned sufficiently then the chick fetus sticks to the inside of the egg membrane and dies.

Ain't nature awesome?

 

[sourland]

Just their instinct to protect their eggs from the predator - YOU.