Losing feathers (not a molt)

[Mel Kel]

I've been kicking myself for not getting around to writing this earlier. I'm going to try and keep this concise, but bear with me!

About 9 months ago (~October 2019) one of our chickens (Plymouth Barred Rock) started getting some "bald" spots on the back of her wings. I didn't pay much mind to it, thinking maybe she was going molt. She never did. It progressed, very slowly. I kind of figured that maybe she was rubbing up on something and losing her feathers this way. But it has slowly gotten worse and spread to other parts of her body. I really continued to push it off, she did not act sick and all my other chickens were good too.

Fast forward to the spring. She continues to have a "thining" of her feathers (the feathers are still there but they are "thinned"), and she has BALD spots. ALL over her body. They look terrible, bright red/pink. As far as I can tell, she is "top" chicken, she always has been, and she continues to remain this way despite looking so terrible. She continues to act healthy, is food motivated, friendly, active, and I believe* is still laying. I felt bad for her, but still didn't put much into it since all the other chickens were looking healthy/good still.

About a month and a half ago I noticed that another chicken (a year younger) had the same thing starting. In the exact same way, on the back of her wings- little balding spots. And another is now looking "splotchy" with her loss of feathers. My chickens have molted before. This is NOT a molt.

Ok. About a month ago, we had a really sick chicken that died. I think* this is completely unrelated, but I'm trying to paint a full picture. We got home after the weekend, she was lethargic, listless etc. Not doing well. We removed and quarantined her for a week before ultimately deciding to euthanize her; she did not get better but only continued to deteriorate. It was really sad for us, our first chicken loss. I don't believe that this was in any way related, I suspect an abdominal problem with her as her belly was very swollen.

As a result though, I immediately deep cleaned the coop (light bleach, removal of everything). I dusted for mites. I dusted the chickens 2x for mites (1 week apart). Although I'll admit, I really don't know if I "dusted" them correctly or not...how do you know? A few youtube videos I suppose.
I have been religious for weeks now with watering with apple cider vinegar water. I give them "treats" regularly with pumpkin, garlic, and yogurt. They now have oyster shells added to their regular food. Nothing is getting better, only slowly getting worse.

Everyone acts very happy. Some combs are looking "blah," others look ok/good, but it doesn't seem to be consistent with the ones who are losing feathers and looking bad. I see them dust bathing, although I plan to buy sand and make a "specific" area where they can dust bathe, as at times the ground can become hard from the sun, but even still I see areas where they are "getting dirty."

I'm really at a loss, and have no idea how to proceed or help these girls. I'm worried now that this was a bigger problem than I first realized, and I hope I haven't done them a disservice by waiting too long. I'm worried it's spreading and will take my entire flock. I currently have 17 chickens, they have a small-ish coop (was "sized" for 15 chickens), but they have a 1/2 acre to roam around on every day; three generations - 8 in the first generation, 4 in the second, and 5 more in the youngest, added to the flock this year.

Any help, tips, ideas are very much appreciated. Feeling pretty helpless, hopeless, and like I've let my flock down I really hope this is something obvious that I've just missed.

 

[coach723]

Sorry you are having troubles. This is a bit long, I tried to address everything. For the one hen you lost with the swollen abdomen, that one sounds like a reproductive problem. Various cancers and infections are not uncommon, particularly in hens over the age of two. The bloated abdomen can be matter building up inside or fluid from failing organs (ascites).
It does sound like your coop may be too small. Having more room to range during the day can help, but feather picking on the roosts at night can happen also. Sometimes you can rework your roost layout and make things work a bit better, but we would need to see pictures of your set up to help with that. Long term, if you are going to keep this many birds (or more, somehow we always end up with more!) then I would really work on getting a bigger coop for them. Bigger is always better, overcrowding just causes problems. And if you have a pre-made coop they pretty much all badly over estimate how many chickens they can hold. One aggressive bird can make what was enough space before, way too small. The bare shoulders and back look like rooster damage or feather picking mostly, to me. If you have no rooster, sometimes a hen will do mounting behaviour, so some observing may help you ID what is actually going on. Another thing to consider is what you are feeding. If they aren't getting enough protein that can also contribute to feather picking. If they are on layer feed then switching to an all flock or flock raiser type feed may help. Layer is usually 16% protein and the flock raisers are usually 18-20%. Just make sure you have oyster shell available to them all the time for calcium, in a separate feeder, as the flock raiser feeds don't have enough for laying hens. The ones that need it will take what they need. And make sure treats (everything except feed) is kept to 10% or less of total diet, that can also lower their protein intake if they are getting to much other stuff.
You may have some depluming mites, those are similar to scaly leg mites in that they are microscopic and burrow into the feather shafts, they are so irritating that the birds will pull their own feathers trying to get relief. I'm not convinced that is what is going on, but wanted to cover all bases. You said you dusted for mites, what did you dust with?
https://www.omlet.co.uk/guide/chickens/chicken_health/the_depluming_mite
Feather regrowth may not happen until they molt again, so this may take a while for them to look better.
For the hen in your first picture, it looks like she's been resting her keel on the roost or laying somewhere else other than roosting. Could be due to crowding, or she may have something going on that is making it harder for her to roost properly. She has what looks like the beginnings of a breast blister, which is like bumblefoot, but on the breast. So you will need to take care of that. Also the foot you can see the bottom of clearly looks like it's got some cracks and maybe some bumblefoot going on, but I can't really tell if it's that or just dirty. The other foot I can just see a bit through the toes, and it looks dark, so maybe some bumble foot there. Bumblefoot could be the reason she's resting on the roost also. So I would soak her feet and keel in some warm epsom salts, clean the feet off and see if there is any bumble there, and clean up the breast blister area at the same time. You can use plain neosporin or plain triple antibiotic ointment on them. If the breast blister is just superficial, which it looks like it may be, then it should heal up, but you will need to keep her from rubbing it again. You may have to pad her roost to help with that. You can use an old towel or something like that, wrap the roost where she goes, many birds roost in the same spot every time. Just make sure it's something they can't peck and eat. Some heavy birds have more trouble roosting and will do this habitually. I circled the spots on your picture below to show what I'm talking about. And this is a thread that shows a nasty breast blister, you don't want it to get this bad if you can help it.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/th...ister-graphic-pictures.1096276/#post-16850510
And the easy foot to see also looks very early, so topical treatments may be all that's needed for that foot, I can't tell on the other. This is what I do for bumblefoot usually:
https://www.tillysnest.com/2015/12/non-surgical-bumblefoot-treatment.html/?spref=pi
Picture below, red circle is where she's resting on the roost or laying on her keel, green circles are the area's on her feet.