Will chickens purposefully destroy their eggs?

[Lisamairey]

My flock is just beginning to lay. This morning, I found a completely smashed egg in a nesting box. The egg was flattened and spread about. It was not "pecked" apart. My understanding is that eggs are very strong. They shouldn't crush like this. Any ideas as to how or why this happened? (Thanks!)

 

[Judy]

More likely it was an accident. They may have quabbled over the "right" nest box, for one thing. Also, first eggs often have things wrong that will sort themselves out later, including thin shells. Hopefully this will take care of itself.

 

[Lisamairey]

Okay. Thank you. And yes, they all DO seem to prefer one nesting box. I've seen two chickens squeezed into the "preferred" box. That's a crazy thing too! Why is one box better than another? I have three nesting boxes for six chickens...everyone wants one box and one box only. Aaaaargh!

 

[Judy]

Mine generally use two of five. Believe me, this is very common. Silly critters. I guess they think that because one uses it, that makes it a "good" place to lay. Maybe this is why golf balls can encourage them to lay where you want. When I'm messing with the nests, I put golf balls in whichever nests they are not using.

 

[Lisamairey]

Yes! I use plastic Easter eggs to tell them that the other two boxes are good places to lay...but they kick those eggs out and football them around the floor of the coop! Guess they know an imposter when they see one! Only the real deal gets to nest in the straw.

 

[jondee]

Just wanted to make a comment on using fake eggs---while my hens weren't fooled by golf balls or plastic eggs, they are fooled by ceramic eggs, and will lay wherever I put them! Our local feed stores carry them, or you could probably find them online. They look and feel like real eggs (I took to marking mine with an indelible marker, because even I had a hard time telling them apart), and even come in different colors.

Just a FYI for anyone who hasn't heard of these and is having trouble with eggs getting accidentally broken

.

Joni

 

[Lisamairey]

Thanks so much for the tip! I will see if I can source these ceramic eggs at my feed store!