Caught an Egg Eater

 Yesterday, I did not go out to the coop first thing in the morning because I tow along a 1 yr old daughter and it was downpouring. (I did go home at lunch to tend to them.) So this morning, my daughter was anxious to go see the chickens before leaving.  I tried to get her some milk and she pushed the refrigerator door closed and put on her shoes. She wanted to see her chickens!!

So we go out to see her chickens, I struggle to open the coop door (all the rain made the wood swell) and was shocked to find not only an egg, but also a hen eating the egg

So now I research. I talk to friends with chickens to see what they have had luck with. I look at blogs and YouTube. Listed below are my findings. I'm probably going to do a mixture of a few things. I'll update you all when I figure out what works.

What could cause hens to eat eggs...
-not enough water
-not enough protein or calcium in their diet (laying & molting take a lot of protein. They get a lot of their protien from bugs)
-accidentally breaking an egg while laying and then smelling the yummy insides.(if that's the case, well, it happens, but I dont want to encourage it. )
-territorial laying (pecking because someone is laying in the box they want)
-not adequate bedding. The eggs break while laying, especially if a chicken stands instead of sitting while laying. If theres in another egg in the box, this can happen anyways.
- feeding eggshells to chickens (need to break down so they don't look like shells.  Other people do this without problems.)


Possible Solutions
-roll away nesting boxes- the eggs roll into a hidden compartment for collecting. 
-oyster shell supplements (make sure you have grit available for them too)
-remove all broken eggs found
-collect eggs through day to lessen temptation. 
-place fake wood/ceramic egg or golf ball in nesting box (dont know truth of this, but I read in a forum they like to nest where there are already eggs?) I'm gonna use golf balls since my husband holds and we have some already. 
-cut old fabric or a garbage bag into strips and hang in front of nesting boxes. I am already throwing old fabric over the boxes to attempt to get them to sleep on the roosts instead of in the boxes already, so I may try this too. 
-poking an egg with a needle on 2 sides, blowing out the contents and filling with mustard.

 Shoot me a message on Instagram or email me if you have a solution that works for you! Thanks!

Beansbeesbeaks@gmail.com