v0.31 Talk:Nest box

Clogs Up Food Stockpiles

Hrm... upon finding a reasonably well-endowed site, I embarked with a couple of these. When I designated a food stockpile, to hold my harvested plants, I discovered that my dwarves plonked one nest box down in the first square of the stockpile, and then refused to add empty barrels to hold crops, instead filling the remainder of the stockpile with already-filled barrels (with plants) and other stacks of plants. Once I dumped out the nest box, they returned to normal behaviour, adding empty barrels and reshuffling the plant stacks into them. Apparently the dwarven mind considers a nest box to be a container, but not one that can hold plants, so they'll add it to a stockpile, refuse to stuff plants in it, and then refuse to add more barrels because there's an empty container already on the stockpile. Annoying. --DeMatt 23:50, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Won't claim nest boxes?

I've build 2 boxes, one for each of my turkey hens, but they won't claim them! Not even if I remove then replace the boxes. Anyone else have this problem?

My (limited) experience is that a bird will claim the nest box only briefly to lay an egg, then it is no longer claimed once they lay their egg (they then leave). It does not appear to be like a bedroom or item, which is assigned or can be claimed.--Dwarvenjames 22:29, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Check your stockpiles for eggs. If they lay a clutch of eggs, and those eggs get transported to the stockpile, they'll abandon the nest box. They won't reclaim it for about 2 seasons, when they'll need to lay another clutch of eggs. Gentgeen 22:31, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Might consider adding that to the main article. I also couldn't figure out why my nest boxes were going unclaimed. Gatherer818 03:28, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Good idea. Thanks. And done. Gentgeen 08:34, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Materials and Skill

The article doesn't say what material nest boxes are made of (though I'm assuming it's just wood/metal) or what skill it uses (is it carpentry, or woodcrafting?) - I'm on the embark screen now trying to plan my next fortress out :P 90.218.171.35

You can make nest boxes out of a few different things -- metal and glass I know, I think also ceramic, not sure as to the whole list. My main question is whether or not the quality of the nest box makes any difference as to laying time.

Location

I've determined that you poultry doesn't graze, but can be adequately penned using pastures. My next question for the purposes of the wiki is: does it matter where the nest is? Does it have to be somewhere the animal can actually reach? Can it be adjacent to the pasture, or does it have to actually be IN the pasture? (I'm testing now, but maybe somebody already knows the answer to this?) --Romeofalling 00:54, 20 October 2011 (UTC)