| Chickens need calcium to produce nice hard shells for their eggs. If they do not have enough calcium in their diet the shells will be thin or soft. You can buy special layer mash that has extra calcium from the store, and you can also buy crushed oyster shells from the store, but I like to save money and make my own calcium suplement; When using your eggs for cooking or eating, save the shells. Once you have a small collection, put them on a cookie sheet and bake on low heat until the egg shells are crumbly. Put them in an old coffee can or bowl and mash them until they are in very tiny pieces. Then you can feed these to your chickens and they get back the calcium they used to make the egg! Note; It is important that you crush the egg shells into very tiny pieces. The chicken can eat the shells in large pieces, but the basic idea is to not let the chicken know they are eating egg shells. Otherwise they could start pecking at their newly laid eggs and that can start a big problem! Kim, from WA, entered 1999-12-14 | 