Strange behavior happening in nesting boxes

[Pegasus667]

Why do you need a porcelain egg in the nest anyway?

 

[Ladies-Eight]

That set-up is brilliant!

How many chickens do you have? They may be kicking the porcelain eggs over the divider when they rearrange the nest to lay their egg. That is my only guess at this point.

I wonder if you even need the dividers.

I have seven hens and twelve pullets. My husband and I debated on whether to use a divider or not. The dividers will just slip out.

 

[Ladies-Eight]

Why do you need a porcelain egg in the nest anyway?

This is the third set of nesting boxes for the seven hens and the second set of nesting boxes for the twelve pullets. I really don't know if I need the porcelain eggs at this time.

 

[BigBlueHen53]

Why do you need a porcelain egg in the nest anyway?

Before my pullets started laying, we put golf balls in the nests to let them know where to lay their eggs. Also, I had about five or six older hens, and almost all of them were laying in one nest, although they had five to choose from. By putting two golf balls in each nest, I got them to start using all the nests. Understand that I love my chooks, but I don't think they are very bright.

 

[room onthebroom]

I want to thank you for your help. It seems that I really upset someone. I did not mean to do something wrong. Thank you again.

I'm sure you didn't do anything wrong. I wouldn't give it another thought.

I like the set up too. I'd keep the dividers in there. They might help the girls keep their nest in the right shape.

I bet the hens are kicking the fake eggs out, but it'd be fun to get a cheap game cam set up & see for sure.

 

[BigBlueHen53]

So you have 19 birds using 6 nests. If two are more are trying to use a nest at the same time, with z couple of inches of bedding in the nest, I can now see that they could fairly easily kick the porcelain eggs over the dividers.

I would suggest you either remove the dividers, put up higher dividers, or remove the porcelain eggs. It's pretty obvious the hens don't need the porcelain eggs as "training wheels" any more, they know where to lay. You get beautiful eggs, by the way!

 

[so lucky]

How do chickens move eggs, anyway? Under their wings or tuck them between shoulder and neck? I know they may kick them around, but don't they sometimes move them to places that can't be reached by kicking?

 

[room onthebroom]

How do chickens move eggs, anyway? Under their wings or tuck them between shoulder and neck? I know they may kick them around, but don't they sometimes move them to places that can't be reached by kicking?

They can move them around with their beaks.

 

[room onthebroom]

 

[BigBlueHen53]

Cool video, thanks. I wasn't sure if "moving with their beaks" meant pulling, pushing, rolling, or picking them up and carrying. This was neat to see.