[magiemay]

 For the last 2 weeks my 6 girls have been leaving me with eggs with no proper shell just the membrane around the egg.  Until then they were laying quite nicely but now most days half of the eggs are like it.   I've read that it is a   lack of calcium so bought some oystershell but the pieces look so big.  Is it alright to give it to them just as it is or should I crush it up a bit ?  Will be glad of any advice.  Also I have been dumping the soft eggs but would they be safe to use in cake making perhaps?

[hillfooter]

Hi Maggie May

The oystershell should be fine as it is if you got it from a feed store.  They also need insoluable grit in the form of crushed gravel which if they free range they will pick up from the ground.

Soft shelled eggs can be caused by a calcium deficiency as you say however that doesn't mean they need more calcium and in fact if they are fed with an ad lib supply of a good compound feed such as layers pellets they should be getting all the calcium they need.  If you feed them treats or corn cut that back to just a small handful of corn each in the evening and cut out all treats for the time being.  Their maybe suffering from poor calcium absorption.  In order to absorb calcium they need Vit D3 which at this time of year maybe lacking (they make it from sunlight) so rather than extra calcium give them 10ml (for all 6) of cod liver oil in a porridge or on some tuna (get tuna in water not oil).  Feed this in the evening instead of a treat and ahead of any corn.  Have the oystershell available ad lib not added to their food.  Older hens are more likely to need extra calcium more than pullets (year olds).

See how they go on this regime.  If they don't improve next time you post perhaps you can tell us a bit about them , breed age, health, moult, worming, laying history and how they are kept eg do they free range on grass etc.

Personally I wouldn't eat softshelled eggs but if they are fresh and clean you could bake with them if you can't bare to discard them.

Best of luck
HF

[Abacus]

I would use a proprietary hen grit which is fine - I use generally use it despite the fact I suspect the hens get enough from the ground. In an emergency I use the old egg shells though that option has been severely compromised since OH discovered I was using her coffee bean grinder to break them up....

[Casey76]

Grit is used to grind up the food in the gizzard, it has no bearing on shell making.

Oystershell is a traditional form of calcium supplementation, though with compound feeds, it eally shouldnt' be necessary; and in some cases over supplementing with calcium can be counter productive as it can disturb the calcium/phosphorus ratio.

If you are having problems with soft shelled eggs, first try a vitamin D supplement, such as fish oil, which can help in the body's absorption of calcium

[hillfooter]

I would use a proprietary hen grit which is fine - I use generally use it despite the fact I suspect the hens get enough from the ground. In an emergency I use the old egg shells though that option has been severely compromised since OH discovered I was using her coffee bean grinder to break them up....

Also using electricity to reuse egg shells isn't very green when a kilogram of oyster shell costs about 50p at my local feed mechants and to get the same amount of calcium from egg shells you would need to wash, bake and crush the shells from 700 eggs and use up a good deal of effort.  All to save 50p of very abundant oystershell which otherwise would have to be used for landfill.

Not all recycling is good you still need to apply it in a smart way.
HF

[helens-hens]

Hi there. I don't know if this will be of help or if I will be shot down in flames  but when one of my hens had a short spell of laying first thin shelled eggs and then softies, in their winter breakfast of pellet porridge I added a little Poultry Spice and spot of cod liver oil for a couple of mornings.

It may well have been a coincidence but she started laying normal eggs again very quickly. PS contains 24% calcium and the cod liver oil has vitamin D3 to help absorb it. Also into the porridge goes, literally, a pinch of cut corn and I have just read that corn gluten contains some phosphorus (don't know if this would apply to cut corn?).

Like everybody says, all they need should come from layers pellets but perhaps some hens sometimes also need a little help?

[Rhiannon]

I feed course layers meal, then in winter i supliment with Poultry spice, last year as new birds they were fine this year one older hen started laying silly shaped eggs whilst trying to moult in patches, she then stopped both and started laying soft eggs...all the other chickens and bantams are fine and moulted and started laying again, just this one is mucking about ....

She seems well in all other ways , mine wont touch layer pellets, they have a big big run but right now untill it gets resurfaced its muddy , they have a 7x5 chicken shed and shes not bullied in fact if theres a dominant one its her .

Theres no sneezing from any of them , thier droppings are fine , it just seems to be this one who incidentaly pecks herself from tiem to time tho there are no parasites present  and no problem with the cloaca .

We have tried other suppliments to and still she lays soft eggs whilst all the others are fine 

[hillfooter]

Poultry Spice is an old fashioned supplement which was recommended for backyard poultry which were fed on household scraps.  Poultry keeping was encouraged along with allotments during the last war to help supplement food supplies.  Because kitchen waste was deficient in many of the vital minerals chx need PS was recommended as it contains a cocktail of essential minerals.  Today's compound feeds contain all the vitamins and minerals a layer should need so really PS is surplus to requirements but it lives on in chicken keeping folklore handed down from generation to generation.  It is very unlikely to have any benefit if your meal is a compound whole feed.

The distorted egg shapes could be a pointer though.  If they were wrinkly shells it possibly due to ovary damage resulting from an infection as a chick.  Infectious Bronchitis is also a common condition affecting elderly chx which causes these symptoms.  I've seen it recommended to give birds who are suffering from IB an electrolyte in their drinking water.  This is a fairly easy thing to try and you can make your own as follows.

Dissolve in 3 litres of water

5 ml of Salt substitute, (1 teaspoon of potassium chlorite)
7.5 ml (1 and a half teaspoons) of Bicarbarbonate of soda (baking soda)
15 ml (3 teaspoons) salt

Try this for 10 days before going back to water with a multivitamin for 7 days

Are these birds Hybrids?  You say it's an old bird which is showing these symptoms.  How old is she?

HF

[Rhiannon]

Thank you for that she was aledgedly a pullet last year, she laid bigger eggs than the other pullets and htey were good shapes some being double yolkers, then when the shorter days came she stated laying eggs where the sharp end showed a few wrinkles , the the white raggy bit in the egg whatever that is was over large , to me i thought it was an umbilical cord or would turn into one? and when boiled the eggs even when well over 10 days old the shell refused to come away from the egg...

She has just after Christmas stopped laying as passes soft shelled eggs from time to time, she seems well , she is whats called a Sussex Star so yes shes hybrid as are the other hens, the Bluebell is a consistant layer , moulted in one go then laid nice eggs again, the Polish pullets have just started laying and the Plymouth rock bantams are comming back in too.

We bought 4 birds from the same place last year and i am wondering if maybe this bird is not a or was not a pullet ? The other two bird were very poor , produceing very few eggs, Cou-Cou and a Black Rock type , they constantly pulled out thier feathers and whatever we did they still did it , all the other birds were fine in thsi respect, no parasites and thier wormed with both Vermex and Flubenvet .

As the other birds seem fien and have had no sneezes runny eyes etc im wondering if i maybe bought not the best birds going, the bamtams came from a show breeder who had surplus stock

Thanks for that advice , i do apreciate it you can read a book till your blue in the face but practical experience is always better as chickens dogs and tortoises dont read the books lol

[hillfooter]

When birds lay extra large eggs and double yolkers some people are pleased but I'm always concerned that they may develop laying problems.  I strongly suspect that the problems you now have maybe more genetic than due to infection or a deficiency.  If that is the case there's probably not a lot you can do other than keep an eye on her for signs of egg binding which can happen with soft egg layers or other signs of depression or illness.  She may recover naturally once the warmer lighter evenings come in. 

Giving multivits, vit D and maybe a limestone flour in the feed may help if things don't improve  naturally but other than this if there's no obvious signs of illness there's not a lot you can do I suspect.  If you took her to a vet they'd probably give her a general purpose broad spectrum a/b but more in hope than expectation.  For the time being I think apart from what I've suggested you are best to keep her under observation and hope it settles down to a normal laying pattern.

HF

[Rhiannon]

I have heard that softeggs can be difficult to pass and  yesterday she was looking not happy at all, neck drawn in and puffed up , i picked her up and she apeared to hve been scouring and her cloaca was side to side rather than well im sure the other chicken bums are not like that , i noticed she was straining later but nothing came out , and hour later she dropped a soft egg .

As long as im doing nothing wrong as if i am i could ruin good birds with incompetance, thats one good thing, if she does not get better or if she does this will return next winter possibly, shame as shes quite a character. If she does not appear to suffer she can continue if she gets worse at any point my husband wil have to deal with her.

As a child his family were all farmers and his father owned a large chicken farm right up to the early 70`s i belive , as he sayes tho hes forgotten more than he knew , but he does know how to dispose of chickens quickly and humainely.

Poor old Sussex , as long as she does not know tho i can live with it...i refuse to get fond of a chicken but you have to give it respect and do right by it as its served us well.

Thanks for that advice , i am very grateful , can you reccomend any good books that deal with chicken problems on more than a very basic level?

[hillfooter]

If you want a good not too expensive health handbook the one I like best is Gail Damerow's "The Chicken Health handbook" £9.80 with free delivery from Amazon  http://www.amazon.co.uk/Chicken-Health-Handbook-Gail-Damerow/dp/0882666118
This is an American text so is orientated to US practise but still very good with an excellent index for reference.  The problem is you can become a chx hyperchondriac reading such books so beware.  There's a British veterinary text on poultry health "A Pocket Guide to Poultry Health and Disease" [Paperback] Paul McMullin who is the Poultrysite website vet.  I don't recommend this to amateur chicken keepers it's very vet orientated with technical language and a lot on diagnosing diseases using pathology lab techniques which isn't useful to the amateur and it's expensive at around £20.  (Joy might not agree).  Don't expect to find a witches cookbook of remedies for every ailment and to be frank most infections and diseases require the services of a vet and often antibiotics which can only be obtained by prescription.

Although I haven't read it, for a general book on chicken keeping, many people recommend the Haynes manual on Chicken Maintenance.  It's apparently well layed out though basic.  It covers a lot of ground.  

This website (though search tools aren't so good) and Googling on the web can be very informative but a word of caution you need to be able to select the good advice from the old wives tales.  There's a lot of handed down chicken folk law which belongs in the dark ages particularly with respect to nutrition and supplements which these days is not relevant with modern feeds and knowledge.  There's also threads on this site which discuss books which are worth a read.

"Starting with Chickens" by Katie Thear is a simple cheap text which contains much good advice for the beginner but don't expect a cromprehensive treatment of the subject though it's one I'd still recommend for absolute novices.

Best wishes
HF

[Rhiannon]

Exelent ! thank you very much, the first suggestion is on order  Sussex looks better today , in two weeks time we are off to a local poultry supplier to get 6 more pullets, thier chicks come from Woodhall Spa area i belive she said and not imported as were this first lot .

Im a sucker for pretty chickens so again their going to be a hybrid mix , roll on the better weather and i can get this fracking rescue Tortoise outside , its doing my head in lmao ...Mr Escapee is now in a dog cage and throwing stuff all over the hall carpet    why dont i learn to say no ?

Thank you again for the sensible practical and obviously knowledgeable advice