Hen pulling her own feathers

Mountain Granny

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I have a hen in a cage by her self. I isolated her to get her feathers to grow back in on her back close to her tail. They have not grown back and it's been a few months. Last week I noticed a few feathers in her cage. Now today there are a lot of feathers so she has to be doing it to herself. Could it be depluming mites ? What should I do ? Need advice. TIA
 
Is she molting? Is she getting enough protein? How long has she been by herself? It's stressful for a hen to be alone. Can she see and hear other chickens?
 
Lost/damaged feathers will not regrow until she molts naturally, adult chickens will molt and grow new feathers once a year generally in the fall. Keeping her locked up to regrow feathers makes no sense unless the other birds are picking on her. Being caged and separated from the flock is stressful for them, I could not imagine keeping one of my hens in a cage for more than a few days.

Depending on where you live, she could be going through her natural molt. They will look fine one day and then POOF they're half naked the next with feathers all over the place. Extra protein will help her get through the molt faster, they need it to grow new feathers so be sure to switch to something like a chick starter or all flock 20%. She will be miserable until the new feathers are at least half grown in, they tend to keep to themselves and huddle away in a corner. Mine seem to prefer staying in or under the coop more often when molting.
 
I have a hen in a cage by her self. I isolated her to get her feathers to grow back in on her back close to her tail. They have not grown back and it's been a few months. Last week I noticed a few feathers in her cage. Now today there are a lot of feathers so she has to be doing it to herself. Could it be depluming mites ? What should I do ? Need advice. TIA
Broken feathers only grow back after the molt but feathers that get pulled out by the root will grow back immediately.Her recent feather loss has nothing to do with depluming mites unless she caught them since you put her in the cage because she wasn't losing feathers until last week.Not growing back and feather loss are 2 separate issues
 

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