Shell-less eggs

My ducks are free range during the day, topped up with bio-dynamic feed as required. They have free access to sea shell grit, which hardly goes down now, although it used to.  One duck consistently laid her eggs without a shell. And usually in the late afternoon.

I added Calc phos tissue salt (also called cell salt, mineral salt or Schuessler salt) to a bucket of water and over a few weeks, she has not only started to lay eggs with shells (started with delicate shells, now good ones), she lays them in the morning. And is the only one laying in the hot summer.

Hello Madeleine,

What kind of ducks do you have? I'm thinking of maybe getting a tiny flock of runner ducks ( 1 drake, 2 females ) to keep the slug invasion in check. What is your experience, do they gobble up slugs?

Shell-less eggs are caused by a calcium deficiency. I find my chicken use the oystershell grit to help their digestion, but they still crave their calcium on the side.
I also had a chicken laying 'leather eggs' until I started to feed some of the eggshells back to the chicken. They would also dumpster dive in the compost heap for eggshells.
I'm not sure salt is good for the birds... You might do a little test as to what they want? Offer the mineral salt free choice and crushed egg shells free choice, let the ducks decide :)

As for the pause in laying, as you've remarked, they lay less or not at all when it's very hot or, like here now, very cold.

Enjoy the peak of summer!

Nina Surya wrote:Hello Madeleine,

What kind of ducks do you have? I'm thinking of maybe getting a tiny flock of runner ducks ( 1 drake, 2 females ) to keep the slug invasion in check. What is your experience, do they gobble up slugs?

Shell-less eggs are caused by a calcium deficiency. I find my chicken use the oystershell grit to help their digestion, but they still crave their calcium on the side.
I also had a chicken laying 'leather eggs' until I started to feed some of the eggshells back to the chicken. They would also dumpster dive in the compost heap for eggshells.
I'm not sure salt is good for the birds... You might do a little test as to what they want? Offer the mineral salt free choice and crushed egg shells free choice, let the ducks decide :)

As for the pause in laying, as you've remarked, they lay less or not at all when it's very hot or, like here now, very cold.

Enjoy the peak of summer!

My ducks are a mixed lot as people give me their ducks they no longer want. The snail and slug issue was why I got them and they did a great job.

The great thing about the tissue salts is they are half making up for deficiencies and half curing why there should be a deficiency, when they have all they need.

My daughter and her family live near Seattle so slug central. They have five ducks, don't know the breed, but they have cleaned the slugs out. My son in law lives out.

Most of my Khaki Campbell ducks have been hatched out and raised by Muscovy moms. Most Muscovy aren't keen on slugs, although some of them will eat them. However, that's led to some of my Khaki's hoovering slugs at any and every opportunity, and some looking at them very suspiciously.

Even more interesting though, when I've had to put chickens in the with the ducks, they've learned from the ducks how to eat slugs. Mine won't eat the huge Wet Coast slugs, but the small garden slugs don't last a second.

In my dreams, I want a garden with a fenced dry moat around it so I can safely run my ducks in the moat. I think it would really help keep the slugs down, but we've go too many aerial predators to let Khakis free range as they're a smaller duck. If I needed to, I'd catch slugs and put them in their water pan to teach them to reliably eat them.

Calcium deficiency isn’t the only cause for shell less eggs.

R Scott wrote:Calcium deficiency isn’t the only cause for shell less eggs.

Well, don't just leave us hanging like that!

I've only heard about it being a calcium deficiency.  One of my layer hens did that in her third year, so I started keeping and pulverizing their egg shells and feeding it back to them.  No more issues.  

Madeleine, this may seem silly and you may have already checked, but could there be a simpler reason your ducks stopped eating much of the shell?  Is it solidified into a block?  Jammed in the container?  blocked by insects or something?  have an off smell?  Pieces too big?  Did you move the container?  Just trying to think of things that could turn them off the shell even tho they may need the nutrients...

Donna Lynn wrote:

R Scott wrote:Calcium deficiency isn’t the only cause for shell less eggs.

Well, don't just leave us hanging like that!

I've only heard about it being a calcium deficiency.  One of my layer hens did that in her third year, so I started keeping and pulverizing their egg shells and feeding it back to them.  No more issues.  

Madeleine, this may seem silly and you may have already checked, but could there be a simpler reason your ducks stopped eating much of the shell?  Is it solidified into a block?  Jammed in the container?  blocked by insects or something?  have an off smell?  Pieces too big?  Did you move the container?  Just trying to think of things that could turn them off the shell even tho they may need the nutrients...

All easily available. I think they're getting all they need from the snails. They're very good foragers and have lots of space to forage. They have been known to cross the road to my neighbours, although that doesn't seem to happen now. Luckily it's a quiet cul-de-sac. I used to have armies of snails, so it seems to be a good area for them.

R Scott wrote:Calcium deficiency isn’t the only cause for shell less eggs.

A friend was told that her chickens who did so, had a virus that was spread by ducks but affected chickens and that the chickens wouldn't recover.

However, her chickens did recover, although it took several months to do so.

This is just one report - don't know anything more about it.

I know a couple farmers with commercial free range egg operations that have had that virus go through the flock.