Egg Eating Cure ??????

[Anonymous]

Tomorrow I'm getting a new chook,she has a problem of egg eating.Will actually wait whilst another hen is laying and peck the fresh egg as it is being laid(could be very painfull for the 1 laying if she missed),her previous owners tried to break the habit by putting a false egg/s in the nest box.This didn't work.

Reading through my few poultry books,Margaret Gregson author of pekin bantams suggests hard boiling an egg,emptying the egg out and filling the egg shell with vinegar and mustard.

great I think,I'll give it a go......only,whenever I hard boil an egg,the shell comes off in pieces.Not sure I'll be able to stck it back together to look like an egg.
Any suggestions I would really appreciate.
Has anyone else ever tried this for an egg eater?

 

[Tim]

Strange - Hard boiling won't help IMHO - what you need to do is blow an egg...

and for that you're going to need to read this: How to Blow and Egg

The first thing to do though is to make sure the laying area isn't too brightly lit - you can hang sacking over the nest boxes part way to help, then collect eggs regularly throughout the morning for a while - as often as you can so she doesn't get the chance to eat the eggs. Check the eggs are being left on a good bed of straw, not on wood as this can cause them to break when laying. Then, provide lots of tasty treasts for the hens in their run - hanging greens, sweetcorn (on the cob) are good to keep them amused I find so she'll want to get back out after laying and carry on foraging and keep a full crop.

After a couple of weeks, with luck, it should break the habbit and you can ease off a little.

The mustard egg can work too but I've found a quick check of the above and a few alterations can work quickly without having to blow an egg.

 

[Anonymous]

How about a roll away nest box, egg disappears as soon as its laid so nothing to eat.

A few weeks of hanging around for nothing and she will soon forget what she is waiting for.

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks Tim,i'd read your article before on egg blowing.I could do it when I was a kid(ah to be young lol)not sure I can still do it but I might give it a try.

If it remains a constant problem I think I will probably have to invest in a roll away nest box Cuckoomad, when I've been checking out poultry houses and accesseries on the internet i've never spotted them.I shall look again.

She arrived this am,and is a Rhode Island Red,the biggest R.I.R. i've ever seen ,she's um,huge.I suspect a tad overweight.Will try taking a pic of her and posting it in the photo bit.The ones I knew as a kid were smaller,and a rich glossy red with no black feathers.She's got some black feathers in her tail and a few in her hackle feathers.

 

[Anonymous]

You can buy roll away nest box inserts from somewhere....think it may be Solway Feeders, bit cheaper than a whole nest box.

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks for that Cuckoomad,will go and check them out. I think it will be easier than blowing an egg :lol: .

 

[Tim]

Not sure without seeing a photo but if the tips of her tail are black, she might be a New Hampshire Red?

I'm sure you'll get her in shape

 

[Anonymous]

I did take some pics earlier,then the batteries ran out,so once they've re-charged i'll post them.The tail feathers have got black ones,if they're tipped it's not a little tip but a lot of the feather.The hackles are the sort of bottle green that I think you can have on RIR's,not all the feathers.She is just so big,I wasn't sure she would be able to fit through the pop hole on the hen house.She makes the ex-batts which are that goldline hybrid look like bantams.I wouldn't fit her in a roasting tin even minus her legs and neck :mrgreen: not that i was hoping too :lol: .