molting hen - crowing?

[cityeggs]

I have a 1 year old Wyandotte hen that stopped laying in early November and began molting. She had some digestive/crop issues for over a month that seem to be resolved at this point, and is still molting two months later. There was a brief period where the molting had seemed to slow, but after regenerating her head feathers and her tail, she's losing lots of under feathers and long (wing??) feathers. Her comb has shrunken and is pale, and is more pale than it was a month ago when she started being obviously ill. She seems to be feeling better - now that her tail is back, she's had it up a lot in the last few days, but the comb still looks so pale and small, and she hasn't laid since November (it's winter, she's molting, not surprised - just data).

This morning I'm pretty sure I heard someone trying to crow multiple times (I am positive I have no roosters) - it sounded like the first attempts of a cockerel, and I can only guess that it was this same hen. Does this happen during periods of no laying - winter and/or molting? Or is this a sign that she has some reproductive issue and likely won't start laying again? She has some other possible genetic (or hatch) anomalies, and has always had thin-shelled eggs despite unfettered access to OS and as many egg shells as they produce, so it wouldn't surprise me if she had some reproductive issues as well - just wondering what the likelihood is that this is a passing phase vs. new normal? She seems to have some new behavioral patterns too, though it's a little hard to tell whether that's just because I had to catch her and give her so much medicine over the last month that she's very skittish around me. Now that I think about it, when this all started, she was also regularly chest-bumping the cockerel I did have through the fence until she started to feel too crummy to bother...

 

[JacinLarkwell]

Sometimes hormonal issues cause that, such as a damaged ovary

 

[cityeggs]

Thanks! It sounds like if I really did hear crowing, it's not a temporary thing that will go away, say, when she stops molting, and that she may be done laying permanently.

I didn't hear anything weird yesterday or this morning, so I'm hoping maybe I didn't hear what I thought I heard...

 

[cityeggs]

So far, I haven't heard any more weird sounds, so I'm guessing it was something else that made the noise - perhaps a dog in the dog park right behind us.

She seems to be back to her full-figured self - done with molting, no more signs of illness, her comb is redder, but not totally back to normal, but she still hasn't laid at all since early/mid November. She was poking around in the egg shells the other week for the first time in months, which made me think maybe she'd start again soon, but nothing so far - we shall see!