Most appearance traits and many behavioral traits in chickens are inherited. There are a lot of different genes involved with about anything. If the person selecting which chickens get to breed use a certain trait as criteria in a few generations you will notice a big difference in that trait.
Combs certainly fall into that category. While two genes, pea and rose, set the base type of comb, there are all kinds of modifiers that can alter the base. Someone that knows what they are doing can get a tiny single comb or a huge single comb, floppy or upright, even with a certain number of points. Some of these breeders are fantastic. But combs are usually very low on most people’s criteria for selecting which chickens get to breed unless they are breeding for show. It’s perfectly normal to get a wide variety of comb size or even type in closely related chickens. If you look at the number of hens and roosters that are the parents of your chickens, they are probably not that closely related.
A hen that is laying will normally have a full bright red comb. In one not laying the comb, whatever size, is likely to be paler and not as full.
Different things can cause a molt. The main one is the days getting shorter but other things can contribute or even cause one. I don’t know how far from the equator you are but days start getting shorter late June north of the equator. It’s very possible the days lost enough daylight by August to trigger a molt, especially if something you would not even notice stressed them and triggered it.
Chickens can’t read. From some of the posts on here and some of the books you read it’s obvious some people don’t understand that. Chickens don’t all read the same book and don’t behave exactly as the book says they should.
Some chickens finish the molt in a little over a month, some take five months. Some chickens wait until the days start getting longer to start laying after the molt, some start as soon as they rebuild certain reserves. Chickens are not consistent.
Different chickens molt at different times, even in the same environment. There are certain triggers that tend to cause it so often they seem to be in lockstep but it’s not unusual in my flock for some to start and finish the molt a lot earlier than others.
While some pullets, especially production type pullets, skip the molt their first fall/winter and lay straight on through, some don’t. I don’t know why. Heredity plays a part, but when they were hatched and the general environment also play a part.
When chickens molt they generally stop laying and use the nutrients that were going to make eggs to grow their feathers. Generally. On occasion, especially when they are very well fed, a few will lay an occasional egg even when molting.
What I think happened to yours is that for whatever reasons most or all started the molt earlier than normal. One has finished and is back to full time laying. She’ll probably lay straight through until next fall’s molt. Two more sound like they are finishing and will probably be laying pretty regularly pretty soon. The others have a way to go.
It is perfectly normal for chickens to act starved, even when they are not. A normal eating pattern, if anything about chickens can be said to be normal, is for them to fill up their crop then go someplace safe to digest it. That’s a normal pattern with prey animals. They are more vulnerable when they are eating so they minimize that exposure. But they are also opportunistic feeders. If they see a grasshopper when they are full, they’ll probably chase it. They see your feed as that grasshopper. Whether they are already full or not, they are going to fill up.
Before a hen or pullet starts to lay she builds up an extra store of fat. A lot of that fat is in a fat pad in her pelvic region but fat is spread out quite a bit. The reason they build u tis fat pad is if they go broody, they don’t leave the nest much to eat and drink. They mostly live off of this extra fat put there for this reason. Even if they never go broody they build up extra fat before they start to lay. If you butcher enough chickens of different sexes and ages you’ll see that.
There is a medical condition, fatty liver, where a hen with too much fat is at risk. So too fat is a potential problem, just like with us. But they are not going to lay without some fat.
Since yours forage for most of the day, how well they are eating depends on the quality of that forage. By quality I’m talking about different grasses and weeds, grass and weed seeds, creepy crawlies to hunt, decaying vegetation to scratch around in, even manure from horses, cattle, or other animals. They will find a whole lot of nutrition in something like that compared to a manicured lawn all of the same grass that is never allowed to go to seed. For thousands of years chickens have pretty much fed themselves on small farms worldwide during the good weather months and produced a lot of eggs and meat for those farmers to feed their families. In the bad weather months they need supplemental feed. How much depends on the climate. I grew up on one of those farms and saw it.
Very few of us have that quality of forage. Some of us have goals where we need to feed then better diets, say someone raising them for show need bigger chickens than these will grow to be and feed a special diet. I don’t know what quality of forage you have, but if they are laying plenty of good eggs when they are not molting I’d think they are eating pretty well.
I don’t see any huge problems for you, sound pretty normal to me, though I’ll admit mine normally don’t molt their pullet year. Not sure what happened there. But you will probably be set up for good production this winter and all next season. Good luck!
Combs certainly fall into that category. While two genes, pea and rose, set the base type of comb, there are all kinds of modifiers that can alter the base. Someone that knows what they are doing can get a tiny single comb or a huge single comb, floppy or upright, even with a certain number of points. Some of these breeders are fantastic. But combs are usually very low on most people’s criteria for selecting which chickens get to breed unless they are breeding for show. It’s perfectly normal to get a wide variety of comb size or even type in closely related chickens. If you look at the number of hens and roosters that are the parents of your chickens, they are probably not that closely related.
A hen that is laying will normally have a full bright red comb. In one not laying the comb, whatever size, is likely to be paler and not as full.
Different things can cause a molt. The main one is the days getting shorter but other things can contribute or even cause one. I don’t know how far from the equator you are but days start getting shorter late June north of the equator. It’s very possible the days lost enough daylight by August to trigger a molt, especially if something you would not even notice stressed them and triggered it.
Chickens can’t read. From some of the posts on here and some of the books you read it’s obvious some people don’t understand that. Chickens don’t all read the same book and don’t behave exactly as the book says they should.
Some chickens finish the molt in a little over a month, some take five months. Some chickens wait until the days start getting longer to start laying after the molt, some start as soon as they rebuild certain reserves. Chickens are not consistent.
Different chickens molt at different times, even in the same environment. There are certain triggers that tend to cause it so often they seem to be in lockstep but it’s not unusual in my flock for some to start and finish the molt a lot earlier than others.
While some pullets, especially production type pullets, skip the molt their first fall/winter and lay straight on through, some don’t. I don’t know why. Heredity plays a part, but when they were hatched and the general environment also play a part.
When chickens molt they generally stop laying and use the nutrients that were going to make eggs to grow their feathers. Generally. On occasion, especially when they are very well fed, a few will lay an occasional egg even when molting.
What I think happened to yours is that for whatever reasons most or all started the molt earlier than normal. One has finished and is back to full time laying. She’ll probably lay straight through until next fall’s molt. Two more sound like they are finishing and will probably be laying pretty regularly pretty soon. The others have a way to go.
It is perfectly normal for chickens to act starved, even when they are not. A normal eating pattern, if anything about chickens can be said to be normal, is for them to fill up their crop then go someplace safe to digest it. That’s a normal pattern with prey animals. They are more vulnerable when they are eating so they minimize that exposure. But they are also opportunistic feeders. If they see a grasshopper when they are full, they’ll probably chase it. They see your feed as that grasshopper. Whether they are already full or not, they are going to fill up.
Before a hen or pullet starts to lay she builds up an extra store of fat. A lot of that fat is in a fat pad in her pelvic region but fat is spread out quite a bit. The reason they build u tis fat pad is if they go broody, they don’t leave the nest much to eat and drink. They mostly live off of this extra fat put there for this reason. Even if they never go broody they build up extra fat before they start to lay. If you butcher enough chickens of different sexes and ages you’ll see that.
There is a medical condition, fatty liver, where a hen with too much fat is at risk. So too fat is a potential problem, just like with us. But they are not going to lay without some fat.
Since yours forage for most of the day, how well they are eating depends on the quality of that forage. By quality I’m talking about different grasses and weeds, grass and weed seeds, creepy crawlies to hunt, decaying vegetation to scratch around in, even manure from horses, cattle, or other animals. They will find a whole lot of nutrition in something like that compared to a manicured lawn all of the same grass that is never allowed to go to seed. For thousands of years chickens have pretty much fed themselves on small farms worldwide during the good weather months and produced a lot of eggs and meat for those farmers to feed their families. In the bad weather months they need supplemental feed. How much depends on the climate. I grew up on one of those farms and saw it.
Very few of us have that quality of forage. Some of us have goals where we need to feed then better diets, say someone raising them for show need bigger chickens than these will grow to be and feed a special diet. I don’t know what quality of forage you have, but if they are laying plenty of good eggs when they are not molting I’d think they are eating pretty well.
I don’t see any huge problems for you, sound pretty normal to me, though I’ll admit mine normally don’t molt their pullet year. Not sure what happened there. But you will probably be set up for good production this winter and all next season. Good luck!
