The elusive egg

Ever since the new babies were big enough to sleep in the coop, there has been a rift in the chicken world. The two older hens rule the roost, so to speak. When all five are in the coop together squabbles are frequent. The babies have taken to sleeping inside the nestboxes rather than on a perch. This is fine, but it poses a problem for Henrietta and Ursula when they want to lay their eggs. Henrietta is an early morning layer kind of girl, and she gets peeved when there are other chickens blocking her way. Some days she rousts them out and lays an egg where she should. Other days she crosses her legs and waits for me to come and open the door and let them all out for the day.

As soon as that door opens she hot-foots her way into the woods. The egg has already dropped down pretty far in her oviduct and she looks for all the world like a kid running to the bathroom with their legs pressed together. Ursula is a bit more of a pain. She waits till mid morning to lay her egg so I tend to miss where she is hiding them. There are four favorite spots and none of them are easy for me to get to. If I am lucky then they will have laid in one of those nests.

I can only hope that when the babies start laying (probably in September) they will decide to use the nestboxes.

The nestbox as I like to see it, with two fresh eggs. Chickens like to feel that they are laying eggs in a safe place. If there is already an egg there, they assume that the location is safe. Using plastic easter eggs weighted with a few pebbles is a wonderful way to hoodwink them. Oh, look! It’s so safe even the easter bunny lays eggs there!

The girls and boy getting one of their many daily treats of corn. James is at the bottom left of the picture---so far he looks like a boy but hasn't made a single attempt to crow. Then moving clockwise: Ursula, Penelope, Sophie (the buff one who is mostly obscured, shoving her face into the corn) and Henrietta. Ursula and Henrietta are 13 months old, and the others are 3 months.


The new re-done nestbox. I extended the roof to cover the entire length of the coop and replaced the cedar shakes with regular roofing shingles. Now I have a nice dry corner to keep the buckets of chicken food. I chopped up a set of louvered closet doors and couldn't resist painting them a gaudy bright and shiny red.

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Number of eggs laid in the coop today: 2
Number of eggs laid in the woods today: 0