captain_squirrel
Hatching
- Mar 18, 2020
- 6
- 1
- 9
These are my first birds and so this is all quite new to me. So let me know if there are any details I can provide...
I have a flock of 8 Golden Laced Wyandotte chickens - they're around 17 weeks old, and about a week or two ago some of them started having bald spots on their backs. One bird is particularly bad, two others have some balding, and another 2 have some signs of balding but I wouldn't probably notice it if I weren't looking for it.
The balding looks essentially identical across the board -- it is always in the same spot on their back, kind of between their wings down to their tail. I have not observed any other feather loss anywhere else on any of them.
Everything else about their behavior (eating, drinking, foraging, dust bathing, energy, curiosity, etc.) all seems absolutely normal.
I haven't observed any pecking or bullying.
I also have checked for mites and to the best of my ability, I don't see any.
I don't know if we have a rooster, but it is certainly possible. A few nights ago I heard some rustling in the coop so I peeked my head in and saw all of the birds scrunched in one corner, and one chicken was on top of another -- but that could've been because I startled them by peeking in their coop door unexpectedly.
Because of the patterns of the feather loss and the isolated nature, my gut sense is that I have a roo (or two) who has started getting into his groove, and chosen a few favorites. But that is largely because I'm guessing mites would impact all of the birds more evenly, and would not be so specifically targeted to the saddle area on every impacted bird.
If you aren't able to identify for sure what could be causing this, I'm open to hear proposed courses of action. Like if I'm not sure if it is mites, is there any advantage in treating for mites, just in case? Or should they be subjected to that only if mites are observed?
I appreciate any help or advice you can supply!
I have a flock of 8 Golden Laced Wyandotte chickens - they're around 17 weeks old, and about a week or two ago some of them started having bald spots on their backs. One bird is particularly bad, two others have some balding, and another 2 have some signs of balding but I wouldn't probably notice it if I weren't looking for it.
The balding looks essentially identical across the board -- it is always in the same spot on their back, kind of between their wings down to their tail. I have not observed any other feather loss anywhere else on any of them.
Everything else about their behavior (eating, drinking, foraging, dust bathing, energy, curiosity, etc.) all seems absolutely normal.
I haven't observed any pecking or bullying.
I also have checked for mites and to the best of my ability, I don't see any.
I don't know if we have a rooster, but it is certainly possible. A few nights ago I heard some rustling in the coop so I peeked my head in and saw all of the birds scrunched in one corner, and one chicken was on top of another -- but that could've been because I startled them by peeking in their coop door unexpectedly.
Because of the patterns of the feather loss and the isolated nature, my gut sense is that I have a roo (or two) who has started getting into his groove, and chosen a few favorites. But that is largely because I'm guessing mites would impact all of the birds more evenly, and would not be so specifically targeted to the saddle area on every impacted bird.
If you aren't able to identify for sure what could be causing this, I'm open to hear proposed courses of action. Like if I'm not sure if it is mites, is there any advantage in treating for mites, just in case? Or should they be subjected to that only if mites are observed?
I appreciate any help or advice you can supply!
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