My hens aren't recovering from their rooster wounds!!!

[wings]

I have a happy little flock of four hens about 10 months old.

We just got rid of our rooster two weekends ago because he was being too abusive when mounting the hens.

Now, the loss of feathers on their backs are not leaving! It seems as though the feathers haven't grown back!

Am I being too paranoid about my girls? Or could this be a ligitiment problem? Could they be pecking eachother? Or maybe they have a nutrition deficiency??? What's going on???

 

[dirtdoctor]

HEY WINGS,

Dont worry, feathers dont grow back like facial whiskers, But they will come back in. We had a RANDY ROO that was picking on a couple hens, finally had to send the ROo to FINISHING School, (read Freezer). Hens will heal up, i use wound coat if their is damaged skin. but give them time.

someone in the chats makes saddles(protects them hens backs)

Go look

 

[wings]

Thanks dirtdoctor! I'll try not to worry!

 

[gritsar]

If a feather is just broken, but the shaft is still intact you may have to wait for a moult for a new feather to take its place.
If the feather is completely gone, shaft and all, it will grow back before the moult.

 

[wings]

Quote:
So I have to wait a while? Oh well...

Is there anything I can do to speed the process of feather-growing up?

 

[gritsar]

When my girls were moulting I offered alot of high protein snacks - string cheese, scrambled eggs, and black oil sunflower seeds to aid in feather regrowth.

 

[The Chicken Lady]

You could feed them some cat food (meat kind -- not kibbles) and yogurt, too. MissPrissy does this and her birds have some of the glossiest, healthiest feathers I have ever seen.

Do you think they are picking at each others' wounds at all?

 

[wings]

Quote:
I HOPE not! Actually, I don't think they are. You can only see the skin of one hen, who got extra attention from our rooster. So I don't think it's too extreme. I'm just a worry-ward...

 

[Pampered Hen]

In some hens it takes a long time to re-grow lost feathers. I had the same problem with my roor over mating the hens and causing bare backs. We removed the boy in February and while 5 girls have slowly grown new down feathers, one girl still wears bare skin.

 

[wings]

Good! I feel a little better now! I was worried that the wounds were from eachother...