Solitary chicken - need advice

[Alex_LJZ]

Hay, anyone used nettex mineral boost powder. I picked some up to see if I find a solution to my soft egg problem. It says add 1 teaspoon to mash to feed 15 hens. But it gives no indication of how long a period this feeds them for. Can I assume that this is the daily amount?

[The Dogmother]

It can be fed for as long as you like, and you don't need to be too scientific about the measuring.

 

I take it that they have been wormed recently, and are fed only on layers pellets with no treats?

[Alex_LJZ]

Thanks for that. With regard to treats, I am a little unsure. They have some hentastic treat sticks hung up in their run but these take weeks to get eaten so I don't think they are significant. They get a few hours of semi free ranging each day either in a small orchard where they scratch through bark chippings for worms and eat the odd weed, or in a run on the lawn. I usually give them a hand full of corn in an evening. In terms of treats fed directly, my kids give them left over pasta and rice occasionally, an egg a week and any left over fruit and berries. But... The weekend before we started getting soft shells I picked up some cheap meal worm from the pet shop and they had quite a few....... They were also free ranging while we had a bbq so heaven knows how much they picked up from people.

 

 

Now I have written that out it looks like a lot. Either way they are on a diet this week because I am worming them, I also added some mineral boost to the pellets an flubenvet.

 

As some people report, they are avoiding the pellets though, I guess the flubenvet leaves a taste. Yesterday they emptied about 4kg of pellets onto the floor of the coop looking for something not covered in wormer...

[The Dogmother]

Can I suggest the following:

 

Buy the pre-medicated pellets, that way they will eat them. Offer them nothing else but the pellets for that week.

 

In general cut out all the pasta etc, in fact most of the non-pellet food you are giving them - that is likely to be the cause of the soft-shelled eggs. Chickens are designed to eat non-processed food such as grains, berries, greenery and bugs, they can't metabolise human food (especially if it contains gluten, salt or sugar) and it is detrimental to their health. Anything other than pellets should be given in small amounts and at the end of the day... stick to a few dark cabbage leaves, some stalks of Fat Hen/Tree Spinach, or the odd apple.

 

Cut down on free ranging when they are being wormed; mine stay in the run 24/7 all that week, and are fine. It also helps to concentrate their attention on the medicated pellets.

 

I'm sorry if this sounds harsh, but it is important that they are fed the diet which they are designed for, meal worms are OK in small amounts, but avoid peck blocks and the like. All the processed treats are akin to feeding a dog on sponge cake - they like it, but it's no good for them and they will get fat and ill.

 

*and breeaaathee* apologies, but avian nutrition is a bugbear of mine.

[Alex_LJZ]

Thanks for that. You hear so many people who feed s"Ooops, word censored!"s regularly you assume it is correct.

[The Dogmother]

Diet is always one of my first questions when people ask about a hen that has stopped laying.... my favourite was the fellow who fed his hens on "spaghetti and mashed potato because they like it"; they were all rather fat and had long since stopped laying despite being around a year old.

[Alex_LJZ]

So following a few days of diet all hens are back up to one egg per day for the last couple of days. One is still paper thin but an improvement non the less.

[The Dogmother]

Great news