Feathers in Run

[vdunn]

Good Morning!! I am a very proud Mama of very healthy and beautiful 20 week old girls. All different breeds. They have a large and protected run and they love their coop at night. I've noticed quite a few feathers in their run and coop. None of them appear to be missing feathers or to be sick. Is this something I should be concerned about?

 

[taurusladee]

Glad you posted this, we have noticed the same thing in ours. Found a bunch of barred rock feathers and I flipped out thinking we lost a bird so I was surprised when we had all four! None of ours look sick, they don't look like they are starting to molt or anything.

 

[lazy gardener]

They go through a lot of juvenile molts before getting their adult plumage.

 

[Blooie]

Yep, my good friend @lazy gardener is right. I expected to see almost bald chickens when molting was explained to me in the beginning, but that's not what the first couple of juvenile molts were like at all. I'd see tons of feathers laying around, but the chickens still looked pretty much unchanged. Hmmmmm Then when mine were almost 2, I saw my first full blown molting chickens - what a hoot! So you can relax....just because you are seeing feathers in the run but not seeing any loss in your girls doesn't mean that a molt isn't happening. They carry a lot more feathering than it looks like they have, that's for sure! Good luck!