Feather loss - only the Jersey Giants?

[NellaBean]

My "flock" consists of 18-20 week olds. 9 pullets, 1 cockerel. All are fine except for the Jersey Giant cockerel who is missing all of his "long" tail feathers and the Jersey Giant Pullet who is missing feathers off the back of her neck. I think i saw a picture of a couple Jersey giants somewhere with a note that they had "cut necks" and they looked like the same neck feather loss as my girl....but obviously googling "chicken cut neck" DOES NOT give you any links on feather loss

Because it is only two birds and they are both Jersey Giants...it makes me wonder. I have yet to see this cockerel do anything with the girls. He is a big clumsy oaf. All of the chickens are approximately the same age and have been kept together for months. Everyone else is fine. I haven't noticed any feather picking but I'm not exactly standing at the coop 24/7 either.

Any ideas?

 

[Mahonri]

I'm guessing some one(s) picking on them.

 

[NellaBean]

Does it matter that they are the top two of the flock? I'm pretty sure they are at this point.....I can't imagine anyone (other than the cockerel maybe) picking at the JG pullet's neck. She is both really tall and really "cocky". It looks like she has pins but no feathers sticking out of them? It was hard to tell as she did not really want to be bothered.

I have also recently upped their protein.....they were on 15% grower, which just seems too low.....so I have been mixing in the 24% gamebird starter, to bring it around 19-20%. I just started that within the last couple weeks. My layer is 20% but none of those ones have started to lay yet, so I have not started them on it. Could that have caused any feather loss?

I am in the process of building them a larger pen but have been letting them out to free range most nights for a couple hours (in my 1/2 acre fenced dog yard). Their current pen is only 8x8, with constant access to their 8x8 coop. Extra inside space to try and make up for less outside space.....but they have done just fine so far and have been together in this coop since they were about 8 weeks old. The posts are in for the new pen (last 6 posts when in saturday), half the fencing has been purchased, just need to get it worked on this week, I guess. The new pen is 16x24, although I may divide it into 2 pens that are 8x24, to allow for "rotational grazing" chicken style, to keep the grass growing longer. The 8x8 pen they are in is meant as a baby grow out pen to hold me until I got the big pen built but between a bad illness and bad weather.....I am over a month behind schedule