The nesting habits of the hen

Suitable nesting equipment is essential for the successful management of laying hens. It should be planned to minimize the labor required in gathering eggs, in keeping nests clean and in supplying suitable nesting material. It is also important that the nests be made attractive and satisfactory to the hens. The tendency of hens to lay their eggs on the poultry house floor, in the poultry yard or in “stolen” nests causes serious losses to poultry keepers. It increases the labor of finding and gathering the eggs; it causes the entire loss of many eggs and a deterioration in the quality of many others, and not infrequently it becomes the direct cause of the fowls acquiring the vicious egg eating habit. This bulletin reports the results of experiments and observations made by the poultry section of the Iowa Agricultural Experiment Station to determine the important factors that influence hens in selecting the place in which they lay their eggs and to learn how they can best be prevented from laying in promiscuous places