Empty Egg!

**Nicos** · 11-03-2009, 08:15 PM

wll- I found a rubbery , open egg shaped casing a few weeks back in he shavings. Nothing since.
My girls have always been fed on ground egg shell- and was a bit strange having a soft shell when all the others cause the pan to wobble when I try to crack the hard shell. Strange isn't it????
How old are yr gals now???...mine must have been already laying ...but just after POL

**Suechooks** · 11-03-2009, 08:36 PM

Originally posted by Nicos View Post

wll- I found a rubbery , open egg shaped casing a few weeks back in he shavings. Nothing since.
My girls have always been fed on ground egg shell- and was a bit strange having a soft shell when all the others cause the pan to wobble when I try to crack the hard shell. Strange isn't it????
How old are yr gals now???...mine must have been already laying ...but just after POL

I've had both of the above!
Minskey - my ex-batts regularly lay eggs without shells. They generally eat the egg and often the membrane but sometimes leave it.
Nicos - I've had a couple of those rubbery things and someone said it was a type of ovarian cyst which is shed. There was a thread and photo some time back - I think it was titled "Strange object in nest box"

**Snadger** · 11-03-2009, 10:47 PM

Only this week I've had two soft shelled eggs (unfortunately laid on a pile of other eggs so they are a reet sticky mess!) and one egg shell with nowt in it!

**minskey** · 12-03-2009, 08:41 AM

Hi Nicos, It was exactly as you described; 3 of the girls are 35 weeks and the others just over a year old.

Hello suechooks,
yup, I give them mixed grit and oyester sheel and the free range in my paddock so pick up all sorts and my pan is usually worse off after i've bashed an egg on its edge trying to crack it!

I'm a bit concerned in case there is something I'm not doing right.

**MaureenHall** · 12-03-2009, 08:46 AM

Minsky don't worry. As the others have said, ex-batts often do this. Also, I think it can happen when a hen has been off-lay for a while and is just coming back into lay. Just make sure she's got plenty of grit and try finely crushing egg shells to add to the food to give the chooks a calcium boost. If it persists, try adding a little limestone flour to the food, you'll get rock hard shells then!

**-pat m** · 12-03-2009, 11:42 AM

Yep

Agree with you all It happens- I had a few during the snow and realised they might have less access to natural grit but I have started to routinely put oyster shell into the morning porridge and not a soft one since.

Regards
Pat

**Flummery** · 12-03-2009, 11:47 AM

Extra calcium (oyster grit or limestone flour) helps with a shell-less egg but the bit of meaty-looking stuff you sometimes get (I've heard them called chicken nuggets!) is called a lash. It's a bit of internal gubbins that comes away and is disposed of through the one and only way out! - the vent. It's not uncommon and doesn't harm the hen. It does gross out the average chicken-minder though!

**Eyren** · 12-03-2009, 02:40 PM

My oldest bantam (she's just turned 3) has been laying nothing but soft-shelled eggs for about a year now. Her egg shells just got thinner and chalkier over a period of months and finally stopped happening. The other two get the same diet, including mixed grit and "recycled" eggshells, and have nice hard shells to their eggs, so I can only assume that her shell gland has just packed it in. She seems fine otherwise and grew a lovely new set of feathers in the autumn, so as long as she keeps passing the softies and doesn't develop egg peritonitis I don't see that there's much else I can (or should) do...

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