Egg eating chickens, what to do

I must’ve met I have not scour the Internet for advice as of yet. Other than giving my flock more food, or eating known offending individuals, where else can one do to prevent chickens from eating their own eggs?

Oyster shell for calcium supplement? Just a guess from working on an egg farm as a teen.

Not much other than ensuring adequate calcium and grit, frying the offenders and careful breeding as it's a heritable trait.

put the chicken in the pot

Blinders will prevent almost egg eating from starting, if put on before the hens before they start laying and stop most chicken that have started. National Band and Tag Company is probably the cheapest place to buy blinders.

Keith

I've had issues in the past. What I'd first figure out is if you've got a hen who is laying thin-shelled eggs. If an egg has thin shells, or the eggs crack, they are going to eat them. You can't really blame them. In the wild, a broken egg would attract predators, so eating it is the best way to remove the egg. I recall having some hens who consistently laid thin-shelled eggs.
Firstly, make sure the nests have enough wood chips or whatever you use for bedding. The more padding the better. Secondly oyster shells. If your chickens have a calcium deficiency, they'll eat the eggs. Also, add some fake eggs, even Easter eggs will help. If you don't have enough nests, or you have chickens fighting over using the same nest, eggs can get broken.
Also, what are you feeding them? I recall more egg eating issues when we were giving them corn. It didn't have enough protein. Make sure they're getting enough protein.

Get those wooden eggs that are designed to show new hens where to lay. Be quick on getting eggs out in the morning when they lay and leave the wooden ones. The offenders will try to peck holes in the wooden eggs. it hurts them, they’ll stop. Gotta stay on the egg removal, though, so they don’t have a chance to peck holes in good eggs. Also, keep them fed.

At my house, when I see one pecking or eating an egg, I put a zip tie around its leg. If I catch it again, chicken pot pie.

i built a roll out nest box to stop mine

Throw a beaver carcass in there for them.

They are short calcium

Does beak clipping solve this?

Put a golf ball in one of the boxes. It stopped ours from doing it. Easy as it gets, but adding calcium to their diet wouldn't hurt too

This. A nest box with a slanted floor. Roll the eggs into a protected compartment.
Alternately, kill the offender. I always executed 2 or 3 innocent hens before putting the axe to the guilty party.

I used a fa fake Easter egg. Also more oyster shells. But, you have to Johnny on the spot picking up freshly laid eggs. Sooner the better. But, leave fake Easter eggs in all the time.

Garryowen

Our son and daughter-in-law have a small flock and we get eggs from them. I don't know how they manage their flock. When I was young we had 1500-1800 layers as a totally hand labor situation.
As stated above balanced rations with grit and calcium are important as is collecting daily and regularly. Any cracked or broken eggs disappeared quickly. When we had an egg eater or egg breaker (usually clucks and many times one can find those in almost all layers on the roosts at night and the clucks stay in the boxes we just made chicken noodle soup when we found them.

Bryce

Neighbor has billiard material fake eggs they look like a real egg. He has to put a dot on the ends of the eggs to make sure they don't get picked with the rest of them! I would bet they hit that with their beaks only 1 time. LOL

Oyster shells! Have had chickens for 40 years. Seen this several times. They need calcium.

When I was a kid, porcelain door knobs were commonly used. Haven't seen one in years.

Find the hen with yoke on beak, trim beak square, put glass egg in nest. When a kid we had glass eggs on the shelf in coop. Also always had a bag of oyster shells on hand.

Have chicken and noodles!!!!