good_egg Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 My smallest girl, lulu the welsummer, is a lot less mature than the other two. I think they are all about the same age (18 weeks ish) but she has a tiny pinky comb while the other two look grown up. She is bottom of the pecking order and a bit thinner than the rest, and she is loosing feathers left right and centre. She isn't as tame as the other two and I put this down to her age, but when I picked her up yesterday I thought I could see new feathers coming through (like someone had stuck the ends of a feather through her skin from the other side if that makes sense). But I'm worried whether she should be moulting so soon. The vet thought she might be a bit underweight and thought the other two were bullying her - haven't seen them do more than a wee peck to keep her in place and coco does the same to Viv. I'm worried it might be because she is on layers pellets with the rest of them and she should still be on growers. No idea how I would feed them different stuff - was thinking about changing to omlet feed if that was a bit more in between? Any advice/help/that's normal comments welcome. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mrs_B Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 My pullets have lost feathers and have grown new ones over the last couple of weeks. I think it is normal when birds are coming up to laying. I had my girls at 17 weeks and they are now on layers mash. The Columbine I have is at the bottom of the pecking order and is small but the lady I got her from explained that sometimes birds which are lower in the pecking order can grown a bit slower than the other girls. I wouldn't worry, your hen should catch up! Regarding bullying - if there is no blood they should be OK, the odd pecking is normal x Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
