Baby chick has funky feathers

[SJchickens]

Hey backyard chickens! It's been so long since I've been on this website, and even longer since I've owned chicks. This spring I made the decision to grow my flock and purchased 3 baby chicks from a reputable guy I've gotten them from in the past. He just orders them from some hatchery, I think. This was about two weeks ago and when I got them they seemed maybe a little over a week old each. They were sexed, but I always have terrible luck with sexed chicks. Anyway, they all act healthy but one of them has... the funkiest feathers. For one, it's growing in feathers much, much slower than the other two (I observed originally that she seemed to be a little bit younger than them, but the feather growth is a HUGE difference now) I read somewhere that Roos feather out slower than their female counterparts, but aside from the growth aspect, they're just... weird. They remind me a little of my frizzled serama's feathers. The chick is a hatchery speckled sussex.

Apart from the feathers the chick seems to act perfectly healthy and is about the same size as the other two. So I'm just very confused! I can see where it's growing in new feathers but it just has so many less than the other two. What's the fate of my bird? Take a look. The last picture is of my two others.

 

[sylviethecochin]

I also suspect cockerel, but please repost in a few weeks.

On a side note:

Male chicks don't necessarily feather out more slowly than females. But feather speed is a sexlinked gene, which means that males carry two copies and females carry one.

In practice, that means that a slow-feathering breed's rooster has two copies of the slow-feathering gene, and therefore feathers out more slowly than the single-factor female.

In a fast-feathering breed, the rooster carries two copies of fast-feathering, and feathers more quickly than the fast-feathering pullet does.

I believe speckled sussex are slow-feathering, but have never owned any myself.

 

[SJchickens]

I also suspect cockerel, but please repost in a few weeks.

On a side note:

Male chicks don't necessarily feather out more slowly than females. But feather speed is a sexlinked gene, which means that males carry two copies and females carry one.

In practice, that means that a slow-feathering breed's rooster has two copies of the slow-feathering gene, and therefore feathers out more slowly than the single-factor female.

In a fast-feathering breed, the rooster carries two copies of fast-feathering, and feathers more quickly than the fast-feathering pullet does.

I believe speckled sussex are slow-feathering, but have never owned any myself.

thanks for all this great info! I know it’s really too early to be going about sexing them but i’ve never experienced a chick either cockerel or pullet that grew in feathers so slowly. Just wanted to make sure she (edit: or he... haha) didn’t have some kind of defect! I’m so paranoid. Thanks for the help~