Soft Shell Eggs and Liquid Poop

[Disheygirl]

Hi - I have three pullets who are fairly new to laying - they’ve been at it for about two and a half weeks.

Two of them are fine - normal eggs, regular schedule. The third - she’s a Barred Rock - is on a bit of a struggle bus. Two things are different than the others - out of five eggs (she was the last to start and has been laying for about 1.5 weeks), two were basically see through eggs (soft and not really egg colored - almost like she plopped a yolk and egg whites off the roost at night with a very thin white cover), two were soft shelled (also off the roost), and one was normal (the normal one happened in between the see-through and the soft shelled). The other thing is her poop, which has been extremely runny over the past month (pic attached). She acts normal otherwise.

She last laid a soft shelled egg three days ago and nothing since. Should I just stick a calcium pill down her throat to be safe? See if it moves anything along?

They are on a local organic soy-free layer feed, have free choice of egg shells and oyster shells (don’t really seem to eat the oyster even though I mix it), and get minimal treats like veggies and mealworms. Her vent looks normal. Thoughts?

 

[Hannahnic14]

I know that when they first start laying you can get some pretty weird stuff! Jist until they get it all figured out. The extra calcium definitely won't hurt her at all. Hopefully someone else can give you better advice!

P.s. Mine won't eat the oyster shell either

 

[dc95123]

Hi, did you get any closure on this? My hen is displaying similar symptoms for the 2nd time in a month.

 

[Dreammaker]

I'm also curious to know if you were able to resolve this. I'm having a similar issue with soft shelled eggs despite feeding layer feed and oyster shell free-choice.

One of my birds (who, as far as I can tell is laying normally) occasionally has "the runs." She poops normally too, it's just that every so often (maybe 6 times in the last 3 months), I'll catch her doing a very liquidy one (gross, I know). Not a cecal poop either; it's just like the picture you posted. She otherwise appears fine, so I have no clue what's going on. I sometimes think she's just got some weird plumbing issues going on internally. ACV and probiotics in her water don't seem to make a difference, so I've basically given up on that. I wonder though if she--like your bird in question--is the one who's been laying these soft-shelled eggs I'm finding.