My girls are full steam ahead in egg production but they refuse to lay in their next boxes. I have a box in the tractor and one in the coop. Instead they lay their eggs all over the pace. How can I convince them to lay in the nest box?
Put a golf ball or other "fake egg" in the nest boxes.....They like to lay where other's have laid eggs. Sandra
You may want to try to leave them in the coop until the afternoon and also what Sandrachic said about putting fake eggs in their nest boxes. Does your flock free range or do they have a connected run?
There in a coop at night, then in the morning we walk them out to there tractor. So the only time they free range is in the late afternoon. It seems they lay all their eggs in the morning so we don't worry about lost eggs in the afternoon free range time.
I'd keep them in the space where the nesting boxes are, if you can. I still keep "dummy" eggs in my nesting boxes, if I take them out they either end up sleeping in the boxes or eventually they start laying on the floor.
I admit got hens to lay in one spot..but cant get them to lay in thier box anymore....for some reason my roo gets in thier and makes a DEEP gutteral noise,all the hens come running to get in the box with him...and then he kicks all the bedding out..and eventually leaves...when the hens go into thier egg laying kick of a morning when they start BAWWKKING an hour long song,they look in thar and dont see any hay so they get to corner of barn and plop down.lol funny chickens
It's true....the roo's can be the culprits! I've seen mine show the girls where to lay on numerous occasions....and sure enough I'll find one there in the next few days....It's the only time I want to throttle him by the throat!!! Often fake eggs on their own works fine, but if not...confinement in the coop for a day or two along with the fake eggs will then do the trick. Oh...and don't count on the morning only laying thing....each chicken has a diffent cycle time...but it averages 25 hours...so that means it would be about 1hour later every day. This held true to one of my chickens I was tracking for a little while. She skipped the day that she would have laid 1hr before sunset and then started over the next morning early. Sandra