Soft egg laying under roost

[HenGirl2002]

If you give them oyster shells (you can get them from pets at home) there egg shell should harden. Try that for a month or so and hopefully you should see a change, if not then maybe try something else!

HenGirl2002

P.S. We do that and our eggs are all ways hard and some times they crack easily but other wise they are fine...

We all so had friends and they had the same problem and we said to give them oyster shells and they had a change in a couple of weeks!!

 

[Cluckincanadian]

I have found that birds will get rid of any eggs that are not right, even dumping a new baby outside if sick. I saw my gander rolling an egg in my yard,50 feet from nest. They know!

 

[goldstar]

My 5 month old pullets have been laying for about 2 weeks. This morning, under their portion of the roosting bar, there was a soft, but fully formed, egg on the ground. This part if the coop is also directly in front of the nesting box- but the egg was not in a nesting box- so I suppose it could be possible that it came from one of my older hens. However, I doubt that as I've never had one if these older hens lay outside the box.

Not quite sure what, if anything, I need to do now that this has happened. I hope it was just a fluke, but any advice?

 

[goldstar]

Sometimes with a soft shell they are lacking minerals. I might offer putting poultry conditioner in with some scratch. You can buy this at a tractor supply store.

 

[LilRedRoo]

I've had younger hens/pullets lay no-shell eggs as they warm up to egg laying. Generally it hits the ground and another hen takes advantage of the easy protien snack. I thought maybe I was going to have to consider some of the diseases until reading this thread. This was helpful and informative. Based on what I've read in here our girls are fine; the 12 laying hens we have left (not counting our broodies - they raising our replacers lately) give us an average of 10 eggs a day, and the shells are always very hard. Just those first few with some of the younger ones had me concerned...

 

[Badman]

Hello again Deacons,
Coincidence, my hen is also a Gold Laced Wyndotte....... I have not received another egg like that fom her again though.

Cheers
Paul B

 

[HenGirl2002]

Thats good you haven't!!

It would be good if you give then oyster shells because that helps them grind up there food!

HenGirl2002

 

[Callous]

Well the grand kids found this yesterday.

It raises more Questions as to which came first, the Chicken or the Egg?

My two Egyptians are still the only two laying good eggs the rest of the girls are still in various stages of molt except for two of the youngest Pullets, I suppose this could be coming from one of them.

 

[Joan71]

I'm getting wrinkled eggs from at least two of my hens. I read that this could be to a calcium deficiency. I put out oyster shells as part of their regular diet. they are free range in the backyard and we give them table scraps too. Their feed is layer crumbles and cracked corn. I also read that a calcium deficiency can be caused by an imbalance of potassium and calcium. Somehow the amount of potassium available in the chicken's system affects the uptake of calcium.

What are your thoughts on this? I just want my hens to be healthy and I'm worried something my be wrong with them.

Bananas are full of potassium. I take my over ripe bananas, mix them into cooked oatmeal and feed it to the chickens. I tried feeding the bananas alone and they were kind of sticky for the hens to eat. So I came up with the oatmeal idea. It works. There is a list of "Foods good for chickens" here on BYC. It is a guide for me as to what is good to give them and what might not be so good. Since I keep them in their run, except for a couple of hours per day, I try to be careful of their foods so not to give them something that might disagree with them.

I buy them Grit and put it in a separate pan. Even if they get some dirt in the pan, it doesn't hurt anything. I had 1 Fart egg and 1 soft egg. Her production system just didn't mature as quickly as the others from her group. All is good now. Laying eggs is hard work. Good luck.

 

[lbrykowski2011]

Same here, I mash banana with a lil warm oatmeal and they love it. Just the oats oatmeal, not the sugar filled kind. I think especially on cold mornings. Found out they love leftover meatloaf also, maybe cuz i put some oats in that also.