Freckles hasn’t laid for an entire month. As she is usually our best egg layer this seemed odd. She usually only takes a ten day break when she has gone broody but this time she hadn’t gone broody but just stopped laying.
A few days ago I felt she was getting ready to lay again. If I came up behind her she would drop into a squat. She started going into the nest box for about half an hour and then would come out not having laid. I put it down to practising as a few of the girls do this when about to lay after a break.
Yesterday she looked really unhappy. She had a peculiar stance and her eyes were closing. I felt she was having an egg laying problem.
Freckles looks most peculiar and very unhappy
I picked her up and inspected her. Her vent looked normal and that odd bump is just soft feathers but it looks exaggerated because she has her tail down. When her tail is up the bump appears to disappear.
I felt helpless as I knew she just needed to get an egg laid. Some people suggest a warm bath to relax the muscles but it was getting near the end of the day and I felt that it would be likely to cause her more stress.
Freckles put herself to bed early. She was first in whereas she is usually the last little girl in. I felt this was the best place for her.
In the morning she ran over for some corn and seemed back to her usual self again. I checked in the chicken shed. Under her roost spot was an egg coloured puddle and then I spotted egg yolk on the bracket behind her perch. There was no sign of any shell at all.
It appears as if she has laid an egg without any shell. I worried about the shell being inside her but I have read that if this is so they rapidly look very unwell and she was digging and scratching as usual. I couldn’t see anything unusual about her vent.
She later went in the nest box for about half an hour and came out shouting. She was obviously unaware that she had discharged the egg earlier. She continued the day as normal.
She was soon happily perching with her flock mates.
The flock perch together
Hopefully the crisis has passed. These girls do like to worry us.
Click here to see the history of my flock.
Hope she is all right – seems like she’s back on form. Maybe she laid a soft-ish-shelled egg and the others ate it – certainly, someone had done just that and several of my girls were chasing another, who had the remnants of shell only this morning, when I went to let them out.
Thinking about it you are probably right. It could have got eaten and then the egg itself had soaked into the shavings so they wouldn’t have been able to get beyond the shell. She seems absolutely fine now and is bossing the other little girls around as usual.
Glad to hear she is feeling well again.
They always worry us but hopefully she will be okay.
I do love sitting in the garden and do enjoy a glass of red in the garden at the end of the day and a chat with the girlies.