Featherless neck patch?

[Smoothie]

I have a flock of four hens, hatched this spring. Quite some time ago we noticed a 'bald patch' on our partridge rock's neck. She's the bottom of the pecking order and I assumed she was being bullied by the other hens and sprayed the area with blue-kote.

Now the area seems to be getting worse; the feathers aren't growing back in. No one seems to be pecking at her (I rearranged the coop/amount of time they have outdoors to stimulate them more.) Everything else about her seems fine.

Also, all but the Rhode Island Red have very shabby tails, showing downy fluffy feathers across their rumps. I don't know if that's just part of some molt or something else.








Anyone have any clue? Any help is greatly appreciated.

 

[Judy]

It looks like they are picking each others' feathers. Usually this is related to too little protein in the diet and / or too little space / boredom. But once established as a habit, feather picking can be very difficult to stop. There are lots of threads on here about feather picking. Sometimes by offering lots of veggie scraps, people unintentionally get their protein intake too low.