4m x 3m Omlet pen, cube, new auto door still boxed and coop light

[sheldon]

My Gingernut Ranger - Peggy has got a bold pink chest and is bold on the backside but not round the vent. She's laying and eating and she's had a couple of dustings with the loose powder even though there are not signs of any mites. Her friend Pat has beautiful feathers no bold bits. What has happened? They both get wormed on a regular basis. What should I do?

 

Sheldon

[tenzin]

Check for mites in the coup at night .

Treat the coup for mites anyway .

 

Make sure the birds got plenty of food and isn't getting bored in during the day .

A tin of cat food can work wonders for a hen thats going through the moult or lacking feathers , so invest in a tin for that bird and let her eat as much as she wants , honestly it'll really help the feathers grow back .

Burt make sure the coups not full of Red Mite , shine a torche in the coup at night time , when its dark . You should see lots of silver tiny speckles if there are , maybe there feeding on her blood and irritating her causeing the feather pecking .

Just got to eliminate all possibly reasons .

 

Hang a cabbage up to giive her something to do , make sure she has a dustbath area at all times in the run .

[Egluntyne]

Could be that she is just going through a moult.

 

If the problem was caused by parasites, then in all likliehood all hens would be affected.

 

Good idea to check anyway though.

 

Other good sources of extra protein are tuna (rinsed), chick crumbs or scrambled egg.

[eggypeggy]

My Peggy too has exactly the same problem! Pink bald chest, but only a very small area so her chest feathers often cover it and you'd hardly notice.. it's only when you pick her up and have a good look.

 

It's been like that for ages and i can't see any feather shafts there so dorsn't look like she'll be growing any feathers in that area anyway. It's not moulting with her. My other pepperpot had just finished moulting and it was very visible when the feather shafts started poking out with feathers.

 

Anyway it doesn't seem to bother her, so I wouldn't worry about the bald chest. On the moulting side of things, growers mash/pellets is also good for moulting birds, help them bulk up a bit while they're working hard at producing feathers. You can get v small bags of growers from some poultry suppliers.