Cockerel eating feathers?

[Cherie1n2]

I have a young cockerel who is just turning into a rooster. 20 weeks old tomorrow. He's been crowing and mounting for a few weeks.

I noticed today that when he grabs the hens to mate and they struggle and get away, he eats any feathers that get inadvertently pulled out. He searches the ground until he's picked up and consumed every one.

I don't consider him a violent or mean rooster. He doesn't initiate any fights and is actually pretty gentle trying to breed.. But I've only noticed him eating feathers. The chickens are housed in a 70' by 35' pen with several roosts and trees and opened coops and none of my chickens peck or pluck themselves. Plenty of feed and water.

 

[aart]

Feather eating, IMO, is a lack of protein-specifically animal protein.
Birds who are molting need extra protein and he could be growing in some new feathers.

What is the protein level of your feed?
You might want to add some animal protein as a 'treat'.
Meat scraps, yogurt(watch the sugar content), cheese(watch the salt content), mealworms, etc.

 

[Cherie1n2]

Feather eating, IMO, is a lack of protein-specifically animal protein.
Birds who are molting need extra protein and he could be growing in some new feathers.


What is the protein level of your feed?
You might want to add some animal protein as a 'treat'.
Meat scraps, yogurt(watch the sugar content), cheese(watch the salt content), mealworms, etc.

20% pellets is their normal rations. He is still growing in his adult feathers so that could be a possibility. I give them frogs and mealworms and they have open access to anything getting into their yard.. Plus my egg production is 9-13 off the 12 mature hens per day so I don't think it's feed related. The feather growth though could be right. I was suspecting he was cleaning up the evidence from the other roosters.

 

[aart]

Quote: Well no then protein lack is not the probem...lol.
Hmmm....'other roosters' might have something to so with it, some kind of territorial thing?
Interesting.

 

[Cherie1n2]

This is his picture. The Ameraucana roo is his only real competition, all the other roos are his age. There are 7 including him but 3 are not mature at all (very slow breeds). So far fighting hasn't been an issue but I was thinking this might be a precursor.

 

[enola]

But if part of that 20% protein is not animal based, that could still be the problem. Chickens are not vegetarians, so they struggle while living in a vegetarian diet.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Unless you are giving them a whole lot of very low protein treats, protein level is not the problem. It’s pretty normal in my flock for some of them to eat any feathers that are flying around. Since I practically always have a mixed age flock with many juveniles, juvenile molts are pretty common. There are often a lot of feathers flying around. I don’t see this as a problem with mine. They don’t pluck feathers off of each other to eat.

It’s not unusual for a feather or two to come out during a mating, especially with juveniles. They don’t always have the technique down just right. If the cockerel is not mature enough (and 20 weeks is pretty young) to impress the hens or pullets he’ll often resort to force. Sounds like that is what is happening. So far no big deal.

What disturbs me a bit is him searching for those feathers to eat them. I don’t see it as him trying to hide the evidence, more that he has found a food source. It may not mean anything at all but I’d watch him to see if it does lead to feather plucking.

I don’t know your plans for your various cockerels and roosters or how many you want to keep. His searching for the feathers to eat would not move him very high on my keep list if you plan on getting rid of a few. I’m normally looking for a reason to put a cockerel on my butcher list to help me narrow it down. Behaviors rank really high in my selection process. I don’t know if this is a red flag or not but if he is in a tie with which one to keep, this would be a tie-breaker. He would lose.

This is one of those things that I just don’t know.

 

[Cherie1n2]

Unless you are giving them a whole lot of very low protein treats, protein level is not the problem. It’s pretty normal in my flock for some of them to eat any feathers that are flying around. Since I practically always have a mixed age flock with many juveniles, juvenile molts are pretty common. There are often a lot of feathers flying around. I don’t see this as a problem with mine. They don’t pluck feathers off of each other to eat.

It’s not unusual for a feather or two to come out during a mating, especially with juveniles. They don’t always have the technique down just right. If the cockerel is not mature enough (and 20 weeks is pretty young) to impress the hens or pullets he’ll often resort to force. Sounds like that is what is happening. So far no big deal.

What disturbs me a bit is him searching for those feathers to eat them. I don’t see it as him trying to hide the evidence, more that he has found a food source. It may not mean anything at all but I’d watch him to see if it does lead to feather plucking.

I don’t know your plans for your various cockerels and roosters or how many you want to keep. His searching for the feathers to eat would not move him very high on my keep list if you plan on getting rid of a few. I’m normally looking for a reason to put a cockerel on my butcher list to help me narrow it down. Behaviors rank really high in my selection process. I don’t know if this is a red flag or not but if he is in a tie with which one to keep, this would be a tie-breaker. He would lose.

This is one of those things that I just don’t know.

I only have two of his breed a black breasted and a red breasted so narrowing wasn't on my mind. He is also not eating random feathers he finds in the coop and I haven't noticed him chasing to pluck, but when he breeds if the female struggles (and not all of them do) he eats the feathers.

I'll definitely keep a close eye on him to see if he's developing a bad habit.. I might be over thinking the behavior. I've spent a lot if time in the coop recently evaluating for foot placement and other characteristics so maybe I'm seeing too much