Mixed up Seasons

[cparian]

I have a pair of purple peafowl that seem to be off schedule. Last year my hen laid eggs in May but my peacock lost his tail feathers that same month as well. This year the peacock got his full tail feathers in by January and was displaying all the time. The hen laid her first egg the last week in February and another egg about every 3 days until there were 5 total. My peacock started losing his tail feathers mid March and now has only a few left to go.

He's not sick, he acts fine, eats well, chases my roosters around like always, no sign of problems at all. My peafowl free range and stay in the same coop with my chickens. I ran heat lamps in the coop all winter that kept the coop just above freezing. I'm thinking the extra red light all night may have messed up their normal seasonal schedule?

Any thoughts?

 

[SuperPeacockman]

Do you have any lights in their coop?

 

[cparian]

Like I said the heat lamps were on all winter and they were emitting a red light.

 

[AndysPeafowlSanctuary]

What is really going on. I've heard from alot of people about there peacocks losing there train. Now all of a sudden, my 2 year old midnight black shoulder white eye is loosing his train, I checked him today and there are no signs of mites or anything. He already has new feathers growing in. He lost his entire train last year so i'm not certain on why he's loosing it. Hopefully his new train will better looking then the one he barely has now. Andy

 

[deerman]

Yes i say thats the problem......peafowl the time of the season is because of the daylight hours, may take some time to get them back on the right time.


They don't need heat in the winter, so don't use heat light.

Using extra light works great on alot of birds, to get extra eggs.
Peafowl start breeding when days start getting longer , southern birds start first ,also southern birds stop earlier also....all because of the daylight, not the temp.

 

[Choctaw Valley Farm]

Quote:
Some folks don't read the whole post before they reply.

I agree with deerman.

 

[cparian]

Okay, that's what I was thinking I did wrong. I really wasn't adding the heat lamp for the extra eggs from the chickens. I was just trying to keep the coop above freezing temps. I guess this summer I will look into alternative heating methods that don't add extra light as well. Thanks for the input.

 

[SuperPeacockman]

Quote:
Yes that is the problem