# Eating Eggs?



## Itsacutefuzzball (Mar 16, 2013)

I know this has been asked before, but my hens are eating their own eggs! It's not a nutrient/calcium deficiency since we give them crushed egg shells, let them free-range, ect. What can I do to stop this? I want to discourage whole egg eating, not egg shell eating.


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## Bee (Jun 20, 2013)

Time...time will stop it. It happens every year all over the world at this time of the year and the only thing that really stops it is time. Calcium is being diverted into feather growth, so no matter how much calcium or protein you feed, it will only go to one place and not to both production AND feather growth. It never works that way...believe me, I've tried. 

A change in hormones signals the body to divert nutrients from production to other things such as growing new feathers. When all the feathers have grown, shells will firm up and egg eating will cease. 

Just give them time. The longer you have chickens, the more you will see seasonal patterns and will learn to accept that this is the way it is, no amount of trying will make this process not happen. Thinner shells will happen no matter how much you increase nutrition at this time of the year. 

I don't get egg eating every year and it actually happens rarely, even during this season, if you provide good, large nests and deep bedding for the eggs to have room and softness when they are laid. It happens more if you have many layers trying to use the same nests(that's hard to control because they want to lay in the same one!) and the eggs build up before you can collect them, so they bang against one another with their thinner shells, creating cracks and leaks. They are then cleaned out of the nests..which is natural and a needed process. 

My advice is to just wait and let nature happen.


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## Itsacutefuzzball (Mar 16, 2013)

Bee said:


> Time...time will stop it. It happens every year all over the world at this time of the year and the only thing that really stops it is time. Calcium is being diverted into feather growth, so no matter how much calcium or protein you feed, it will only go to one place and not to both production AND feather growth. It never works that way...believe me, I've tried. A change in hormones signals the body to divert nutrients from production to other things such as growing new feathers. When all the feathers have grown, shells will firm up and egg eating will cease. Just give them time. The longer you have chickens, the more you will see seasonal patterns and will learn to accept that this is the way it is, no amount of trying will make this process not happen. Thinner shells will happen no matter how much you increase nutrition at this time of the year. I don't get egg eating every year and it actually happens rarely, even during this season, if you provide good, large nests and deep bedding for the eggs to have room and softness when they are laid. It happens more if you have many layers trying to use the same nests(that's hard to control because they want to lay in the same one!) and the eggs build up before you can collect them, so they bang against one another with their thinner shells, creating cracks and leaks. They are then cleaned out of the nests..which is natural and a needed process. My advice is to just wait and let nature happen.


Actually, I leave nest-making to the hens (since they refuse to use nest boxes). Is this causing the leaking eggs and thin shells you mention?


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## Bee (Jun 20, 2013)

It's not causing the thin shells...that's a seasonal, hormonal thing and not a nutritional or behavior problem.

But where they nest, the number of eggs in the nest, the number of hens using that one nest WHILE the shells are a little more brittle can contribute towards them getting damaged. 

How they climb into the nest, if they have to step on eggs, if the eggs are piled up on one another when a fat hen rests on them to have an egg, if the surface on which they are laying is hard and not soft, etc....all these things can cause damage to fragile eggs at this time of year.


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## calebpayne70 (Oct 6, 2013)

Actually the laying feeds have more nutrition so that would make the eggs have a thicker shell


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## calebpayne70 (Oct 6, 2013)

Don't feed them shells if u want to feed a chicken eggs then cook them and don't let them see a egg shell


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## Bee (Jun 20, 2013)

Many, many people feed chickens fresh egg shells and even fresh, broken eggs without causing chickens to eat eggs. That's an old wive's tale that just refuses to die.


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## jennifer (May 14, 2013)

You know I had an egg eater.. She was in there waiting for the chickens to lay and went right for them! I have know idea why. She wandered through the woods with the roo and lives down the road now. But I feed all my shells to my hens now and I have not seen an egg eater In this flock. Broken eggs and jelly eggs they eat on their own. I get about 7-9 eggs a day from 9 hens.


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