sakerobot
Chirping
One of our hens has been occasionally laying incomplete or soft shelled eggs for a couple months. Today we finally confirmed that it's the hen we've been suspecting.
She's one of our Barred Rocks that were hatched in May 2023. The other hens of her age have all gone through molting.
We know she hasn't molted for two reasons: her head is still bald from last year, while the other two with such haircuts have grown theirs back. She also has short feathers on one wing - from being clipped due to getting to roost in a hemlock tree in the fall of 23.
The soft shelled eggs are not consistent, sometimes the eggs have hard shells, sometimes only the tip of the egg is soft:
We found an extra large egg that had a double yolk the other week which might be hers too:
She was one of the few hens who kept laying eggs daily in the winter.
Could stress be a factor? She lost her rooster and a fellow BR hen to a hawk in January, by which point everyone else had molted or was going through a molt. They're fully netted now, so hawks aren't a problem. We also have a few young roosters, the offspring of the brave father.
She has also always been a very weird chicken, who is known for making a very unusual loud cackling noise that sounds like a forest witch. I don't know if her personality could play any role in her not molting correctly.
Is there a way to encourage her to molt? It's in the 70s here during the day, and the days are long and sunny.
She's one of our Barred Rocks that were hatched in May 2023. The other hens of her age have all gone through molting.
We know she hasn't molted for two reasons: her head is still bald from last year, while the other two with such haircuts have grown theirs back. She also has short feathers on one wing - from being clipped due to getting to roost in a hemlock tree in the fall of 23.
The soft shelled eggs are not consistent, sometimes the eggs have hard shells, sometimes only the tip of the egg is soft:
We found an extra large egg that had a double yolk the other week which might be hers too:
She was one of the few hens who kept laying eggs daily in the winter.
Could stress be a factor? She lost her rooster and a fellow BR hen to a hawk in January, by which point everyone else had molted or was going through a molt. They're fully netted now, so hawks aren't a problem. We also have a few young roosters, the offspring of the brave father.
She has also always been a very weird chicken, who is known for making a very unusual loud cackling noise that sounds like a forest witch. I don't know if her personality could play any role in her not molting correctly.
Is there a way to encourage her to molt? It's in the 70s here during the day, and the days are long and sunny.
