Raggedy looking chick

[Easily Confused]

Hi Everyone! New here and new to chickens so please bear with me. I have a Gold Star pullet that is 5 weeks old. I noticed about a week ago that she looks like she is having a bad hair day. Her big girl feathers are coming in nicely execpt that all of a sudden it looks like someone has taken her down and given her a noogie. This is all over her body, her head is still baby fuzz. I've had a few people suggest that she is moulting, but she is just a baby and she is just getting her feathers in. They can't be falling out yet?! She doesn't have any bald patches, I don't see anyone else beating on her, and she rips around and is eating. Her feathers started coming in normal, but then have started to grow in 12 different directions. Like I say, she looks like she just climbed out of bed after a tough night. Any suggestions? Thanks.

 

[Yay Chicks!]

First off,

Do a search on "Frizzle" or "Frizzled" and see if those pictures look like what your pullet's feathers look like.

 

[Easily Confused]

mmmmm. Not really. But those frizzles are really cool. Some of the frizzle pics I saw were frizzle looking as babies. And as a baby, she looked like all my others. Since she is only a week into this stage, maybe I will just have to wait longer and see what happens. All the others I got with her have normal feathers.

 

[Ariel301]

Check her for mites, sort of lift up the feathers in several areas and see if you can see any little yellowish bugs. That can make them pretty rough looking.

Chicks that age are usually a little ugly, they go through sort of an awkward stage when they're first growing in their feathers, but if they are healthy, they will look nice again eventually.