Hello all,
We have three brown hens that are well-fed and in a good run with plenty of space and bugs to eat.
Lately we have noticed that one of them, the smallest, is looking a little dishevelled. Today we realised that she is missing a lot of feathers - mostly on her chest but in other spots too. There are lots of feather 'stumps' apparent. The other girls seem to have the same symptoms developing too.
We spoke to a local (ie, suburban) vet and they suggested we spray the chickens with a mite spray, which we did a couple of hours ago, but at dusk tonight we noticed the hens pecking each other. It was in a very gentle way, no aggression there, but plenty of loose feathers seemed to be getting plucked free.
We haven't noticed this behaviour before but then we don't spend a lot of time watching them. Are they just moulting, or is there something else going on? Should we be concerned by this gentle pecking?
For what it's worth we've also noticed a couple of 'lumpy' eggs lately - could this be related?
The chickens were apparently 20 weeks old when we got them in November, so they are something like 14 months old now and it is mid-late winter here in Melbourne (our first with chickens).
Any input would be much appreciated, we don't want to rush off to a more experienced vet if everything is normal but we are a bit concerned...
We have three brown hens that are well-fed and in a good run with plenty of space and bugs to eat.
Lately we have noticed that one of them, the smallest, is looking a little dishevelled. Today we realised that she is missing a lot of feathers - mostly on her chest but in other spots too. There are lots of feather 'stumps' apparent. The other girls seem to have the same symptoms developing too.
We spoke to a local (ie, suburban) vet and they suggested we spray the chickens with a mite spray, which we did a couple of hours ago, but at dusk tonight we noticed the hens pecking each other. It was in a very gentle way, no aggression there, but plenty of loose feathers seemed to be getting plucked free.
We haven't noticed this behaviour before but then we don't spend a lot of time watching them. Are they just moulting, or is there something else going on? Should we be concerned by this gentle pecking?
For what it's worth we've also noticed a couple of 'lumpy' eggs lately - could this be related?
The chickens were apparently 20 weeks old when we got them in November, so they are something like 14 months old now and it is mid-late winter here in Melbourne (our first with chickens).
Any input would be much appreciated, we don't want to rush off to a more experienced vet if everything is normal but we are a bit concerned...
