When should I open nest boxes?

[2hotchicks]

My 2 slw (my first chicks) are about 13 weeks old. To discourage sleeping in the nest boxes, I blocked them on day 1 (thanks byc) & they are still blocked. When should I open the nest boxes?

 

[Ridgerunner]

Very soon. Are they sleeping on the roost? Is the roost higher than the nests?

The earliest I've had a pullet start to lay is 16 weeks. That's really rare but it happens. Often a pullet starts looking for a good place for a nest about a week before she starts to lay. I want my nests under consideration as a good place to lay. There is no guarantee that she will choose your nests even if they are open and you have a fake egg in there, but if the nests are not open you will be training her to not lay in the nests.

I want the nests open several days early anyway to see if I have a problem. Part of them checking out possible nests includes scratching. Before they lay an egg they often scratch to rearrange the bedding. If they scratch bedding or fake eggs out that means you need to fix the nest. That usually involves raising the lip to make it harder for them to scratch things out. I prefer doing that before they scratch a real egg out of the nest.

If they are going to sleep in the nests I want to know that so I can fix it before I get poopy eggs. That means the nests need to be open before they start to lay.

Only two pullets indicate that you might have a really small coop, many people with very few chickens do. Hopefully you have more. They need to be able to get up to the roosts and back down. That may become an issue in a really tiny coop, they may not have room to get up and down. So all the more reasons to open the nests sooner rather than later.

 

[2hotchicks]

Very soon. Are they sleeping on the roost? Is the roost higher than the nests?

The earliest I've had a pullet start to lay is 16 weeks. That's really rare but it happens. Often a pullet starts looking for a good place for a nest about a week before she starts to lay. I want my nests under consideration as a good place to lay. There is no guarantee that she will choose your nests even if they are open and you have a fake egg in there, but if the nests are not open you will be training her to not lay in the nests.

I want the nests open several days early anyway to see if I have a problem. Part of them checking out possible nests includes scratching. Before they lay an egg they often scratch to rearrange the bedding. If they scratch bedding or fake eggs out that means you need to fix the nest. That usually involves raising the lip to make it harder for them to scratch things out. I prefer doing that before they scratch a real egg out of the nest.

If they are going to sleep in the nests I want to know that so I can fix it before I get poopy eggs. That means the nests need to be open before they start to lay.

Only two pullets indicate that you might have a really small coop, many people with very few chickens do. Hopefully you have more. They need to be able to get up to the roosts and back down. That may become an issue in a really tiny coop, they may not have room to get up and down. So all the more reasons to open the nests sooner rather than later.

Thank you for the helpful info. My coop is small, only 25"x25", but with only 2 pullets they easily get on & off roost bars. They sleep on the 2x4 roost, but after a couple cold nights it looked like they had slept in the bedding/litter (it was rearranged with chicken body size indentations).