bloody bums and molting?

[WalnutRidge]

I am a newbie at this whole chicken thing. So, when my husband told me that a couple of our girls had bloody butts, I looked it up on here and read lots of threads and wrote down all the different advice. I immediately went to the store and bought blue kote, wonder dust, a red light and a pecking block. Unfortunately I didn't get back to the chickens in time and they killed one of my Buffs. Her name was Lily and she was the sweetest lil girl and we were beyond devastated. So, I separated the other 2 Buffs from the rest of my mixed group and blue koted their bums and changed all the lights to red and kept them all locked in the coup for a couple of days. This did help, but I'm still not sure why it started in the first place. Most of them have been molting for the past few months, or at least I thought they were molting. I've checked them all and there are no mites in sight. I'm down to one Buff and one black sex link that still have to be blue koted daily, but they are no where near as bloody as they once were. I just hope they start getting feathers back and quit picking on each other. I'm terrified to go down to the coup and find another one of my girls gone. I would like to thank everyone on hear for their helpful information that I've already received and am always willing to try anything to make my girls (and our rooster) happy, so if there's anything else I should try or consider, please let me know.

 

[Judy]

It would help if you would answer the questions here. This is linked in a sticky (blue box) at the top of this forum.

Unless they are young chicks, there should be no need for lights.

 

[WalnutRidge]

3 hens and the rooster will be 1 year old the end of March and the rest will be 1 year old I think at the end of May. I have lights in the shed because it is freezing here and their water and eggs were freezing, not to mention the chickens themselves were not happy. I checked bums again today while feeding them and there isn't any more blood, so whatever that was all about must have been fixed by one of the things I tried. I wish they'd start getting some feathers back though, has to be cold as heck without them. The 2 older hens aren't molting at all, but the rooster was the first to start losing feathers, then the rest followed. Mostly on their backs above the tail and around their bums.