I think we got duped

[Melrow1015]

We bought 7 supposedly 1.5 year old lavender orpington hens and were a little suspicious on a few of their ages. I know it’s difficult to tell but here’s one of our hens faces. Her face is so wrinkly compared to our pullets. Her neck has been pretty bald for about a month and I haven’t seen any sign of feather regrowth. We have another hen that’s about the same. The last photo is one of our pullets for comparison

 

[CombNWattles]

I can’t see the pictures…

 

[Melrow1015]

I can’t see the pictures…

Sorry about that! Somehow it posted before I was done with the post!

 

[BlindLemonChicken]

I don’t know anything about chicken wrinkles but now is about the time of year when chickens molt and there’s a hard molt around that age so I wouldn’t be stressed.

 

[Melrow1015]

I don’t know anything about chicken wrinkles but now is about the time of year when chickens molt and there’s a hard molt around that age so I wouldn’t be stressed.

Makes sense. I’ve been expecting them to look pretty scraggly at about this time since it’s cooling off here. We’ve already had our little hen have a hard molt. She almost looked like a hedgehog the poor thing . Some of them I can tell have replaced some new feathers and I honestly couldn’t even tell when they did it they just have random new looking feathers mixed in with dirty scraggly ones lol

 

[chooki]

Sometimes wrinkles have nothing to do with age, it comes with genetics. I have bought Australorp and barnevelder from the same breeder, they came as day olds and starting to have wrinkles at a few months old. They are now nearly 3 yo and very healthy, still wrinkly though.

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[Melrow1015]

Sometimes wrinkles have nothing to do with age, it comes with genetics. I have bought Australorp and barnevelder from the same breeder, they came as day olds and starting to have wrinkles at a few months old. They are now nearly 3 yo and very healthy, still wrinkly though.

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I hadn’t heard that before! I had just heard it meant they were old lol. Good to know!