For the record, I never stated my method was painless. I simply like the way the birds look as apposed to pinioning and feel it is less painless to an adult bird. I am simply trying to explain this the same way you are all explaining pinioning, so stop insulting me and going on about which method is more cruel and just let me explain it, alright. I'm still trying not to argue, but if you dislike it when I insult pinioning, please stop insulting the FFR method and trying to say it is cruel and painful, cause the same has been said about pinioning.
FFR can be accurately performed on a small bird. On a two week old bird you should be able to see where the follicles are or at least have a general idea. Remove a small area on the wing of the skin at the edge. An area about the size of half your fingernail in length. It is on the section of the wing past the last joint. Given it does take a good eye to see the follicles, but they are there.
An FFR wing looks the same as a natural wing when the wings are folded just as a feather clipped wing does. The bird flaps and the gap can be seen, but it is not apparent until then.
A damaged feather follicle will rarely grow a good feather back, if any at all. It is not nescessary to cut all the way to the bone in order to prevent the growth of new feathers. A wing has very little flesh on it and is mostly comprised of the feathers themselves. If you look at a wing you will notice how narrow the actual wing is and how thin thit is. Removing the follicles removes a fairly shallow ammount of flesh given the thin flesh covering of the wing.
