why are my hens laying there eggs while there roosting at night

[ams3651]

are your nest boxes too high up that they want to roost in there. Mine are set about a foot off the floor. If your having a roosting problem let the boxes closed for a while and deal with the eggs on the floor. After they learn where to roost reopen the nests.

 

[BawkinOnTheBench]

We had to resort to closing our nest boxes at night for awhile too. We had some young pullets move in with 3 older girls, and the older ones would peck them when they got up on the roost. I think the younger ones just liked the boxes too. So we would put cardboard over the boxes, but not until about 15 minutes before they would go to roost, and then once everyone was settled down we took the cardboard out. We only had to do this for about 3-4 weeks before they figured it out; we don't do it anymore.

The only eggs I've found on the floor under the roost is from the occasional new layer, and the ones with no/soft shell. For some reason those always seem to be produced during the night.