Chicken Coop Nesting Boxes: How to Make Your Chickens Most Productive

After building a chicken pen, chicken coop nesting boxes are often the next step in completing the project.  These nesting boxes come in various shapes and sizes.  The size and shape is dependent upon the number of chickens you have and the size of your coop.  One also must choose whether to build their chicken coop nesting boxes with practicality in mind or aesthetics.

Chicken nesting boxes must be built with the goal of being the most productive.  In other words, we want our chickens to lay the most eggs possible.  Most boxes are built in a similar manner: build the box and fill it with straw.  However, if your chicken is not as productive as you’d like, your nesting box could be the issue.

Nesting boxes are often built to fit as many chickens as possible.  While there are good reasons for building boxes in this manner, it can decrease your egg production.  When larger boxes get crowded, chickens tend to lay eggs on the floor to avoid the crowd.  This can cause the eggs to get lost in the dirt, broken, or eaten.   Chickens lay more eggs in smaller nesting boxes where there isn’t a big crowd.  There tends to be less mess with the straw staying in the box.  A box that fits 3-4 chickens would suffice.

The angle of the nesting box roof should be at an angle.  This is to prevent the chickens from roosting on the roof.  If they are roosting on top of the roof chances are some of your eggs will be laid there also.  Chicken eggs rolling off the roof is not the most productive way to get eggs.

A chute placed where the laid eggs can roll to a separate location will increase your production.  Frequent interruptions that disturb the chickens can destroy the eggs.  Installing a chute might add to your costs but it will increase the amount of eggs you will have.

If you don’t want to build a chute, you can install doors at the back of the chicken coop nesting boxes.  This will allow you to collect eggs without disturbing the chickens.  You should build a lip at the edge to the box to prevent the eggs from falling out when you open the door. 

The size of the box will vary but you generally want the height to be approximately nine inches.  If you want to limit the amount of chickens in each nesting box as suggested earlier, they should be about 12 square inches. 

These were a few suggestions to make your chickens more productive by optimizing your chicken coop nesting boxes.  If your chicken is not laying eggs at the rate you would like, try implementing some of these suggestions.

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