Bare spots.

[craftytammie]

We have 6 hens, all coming up on a year old. A mix of 2 RIR, 2 Ameracaunas, a Buff Orphington and a Black Sex Link. They lay well, now that winter is ending we get 5-6 eggs a day. This past two weeks I've noticed a lot of feathers in the nest boxes. We finally had a couple of warm days, so I let them out to roam the yard and noticed that three of them had bare spots on their backs, just above the tails. I have plenty of food out for them, as well as fruit and veggie scraps. My first thought was maybe they were molting, but from what I've read they are too young and molting would start at the neck? We gave them live mealworms a few times over the past month as a treat, but since then the RIR have become quite bold and will peck at my hands when I'm in the coop with them. I haven't witnessed any bullying, but if I had to guess it would be them. I will try to get a picture tomorrow. I wasn't that concerned until I started reading the threads here, now I'm worried about what's causing it! I just hope I won't have to separate them, I really don't have a way to do that.

 

[RoosterDoo]

You didn't mention it, but do you have any roosters? If you do, it is most likely the roosters pulling feathers out during treading (mating).

 

[craftytammie]

No rooster. On closer inspection, I found that 4 of the 6 have bare spots with fuzzy looking feathers around them. I didn't see any signs of bugs in their feathers. I took this pic to show the worst of the bunch, the black Ameracauna, and one of the RIR. The two that don't have bare spots are our Buff Orphington and our white Ameracauna, who is also the smallest of the hens. They all lay in the same nest box, even though we have three of them, and I am finding lots of feathers there - could they be fighting over the box?



I feel kind of dumb about this. I am pretty new to chickens and I just want them to be healthy! Any advice is appreciated!

 

[RoosterDoo]

I am going to redirect you to another series of posts on things that could be causing this. Hopefully you can run through their ideas and treat accordingly. > https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/159593/hen-missing-feathers-on-her-lower-back-not-a-rooster