Why is sleeping in the nest so bad?

[chachie]

So bear with me, I'm new, but why exactly is sleeping in the nest so bad? I see posts saying you'll get poopy eggs but is that the only issue? I ask because my 4 hens live in a chicken tractor and are all now laying consistently 3-4 eggs a day. They have a roost but choose to sleep in the nest boxes.

Yes they do poop in the nests but I change the bedding every few days and the eggs are never dirty. If I block the nests, they choose to sleep on the floor rather than the roost. Also, I can't place them on the roost at night due to the nature of the design of the tractor (didn't think I'd need to place the chickens at first during the design phase of the tractor...my bad). From what I can tell, all 4 hens are healthy and happy.

I'd like to hear some opinions from others here. Does anyone let their chickens sleep in the boxes? Is poop the only issue?

Thanks for the info

 

[my sunwolf]

Poop can become a serious issue if you are trying to incubate your eggs and they're coming out of the nests coated in it, which will happen if you have a lot of chickens all sleeping in the boxes (this is a problem right now because I have mixed ages in the coop). So yes, poop is pretty much the only issue I've had with them sleeping in the boxes. I really have no choice in the matter, though

 

[TheGoodLifeGirl]

Like you I just change out the straw in our nesting box when that happens, our eggs are never covered in poop even when they poop in the nesting box. If you have a lot of Chickens using the same nesting box it's easy to see how this can become a problem as the eggs will time time (or all the time) be covered in poop which you don't want. But with our two hens it's not really much of a problem even when they sleep in the nesting box. It's more down to if there are too many sleeping in the same box and the eggs are getting covered in poop.

 

[my sunwolf]

Definitely, having 2-8 chickens is a lot different than having 100+

 

[chooks4life]

If the hay or whatever you put in the box is consistently dampened by anything including faecal matter you run the exacerbated risk of them breathing in more spores of mold etc than they would on the perch, therefore an exacerbated risk of respiratory disease. Also they're more likely to end up consuming more faecal matter every day as they clean their belly and breast feathers, not to mention mites or other problems are easier to spread, and the nest can become a place they don't view as being a viable egg-laying place. Once enough birds sleep and poop there any hen with half an instinct is going to reject it, it's usually only a matter of time.

Personally I think it's far healthier for birds to perch if built to perch, I find it's only my faulty birds who choose not to. If the nest is on level with or higher than the perches you've got almost no hope of getting them to roost on the perches.