Hen plucking at others

[JAR26]

Hello,
From my last post, I had found an injured hen that had been plucked and pecked at quite severly. I wasnt sure if all or one of my hens was the culprit. I had seperated the injured bird for several weeks (along with another one who got pecked on after she started molting) and she was now fully healed and her feathers grew back so I put her back with the flock last night and hoped for the best. To my surprise, this morning everything seemed well but the one hen I suspected of pecking was just shadowing the recovered hen and looking at her lower back for something to peck and sure enough, pulled and ate two small feathers off her back in the 2 minutes I was there. So i removed the culprit and isolated her. I dont know what else to do to stop this. She only pecks at her sisters (she is a bovin brown and i have 2 others that were injured and isolated for several weeks). She hasnt been pecking at the barred rocks she was kept with so if the behavior didnt stop while the other two were away...i'm not sure what else I can do. They have lots of room, dust bath, things to scratch at and layer feed from the coop store (same as they have been on always). Thanks for any advice.

 

[sourland]

Do an on site search on Pin Less Peepers they can be used to stop the feather pecking/plucking, and sometimes the habit can be broken. Good luck.

 

[JAR26]

I should add that their layer pellets are 16% protein and that most of them are not laying right now due to winter. The co-op store has a higher protein one for 'show birds', should I mix some of that with my layer feed. They have 17% or 20% option ? They also have year round access to oyster shells (the level of it doesnt go down so i'm not sure if they use it much). Or should I just give high protein treats everday? Thx