Birds not moulted yet

chickenfan

Active member
Joined
Mar 9, 2013
Messages
1,049
Reaction score
0
It is now mid-December but about half my birds haven't moulted yet and I'm worried about them moulting in freezing weather. I have kept them on layers pellets. Should I have given them a low protein diet to bring them into moult?
 
Two of ours have just started and are rather cold at the moment Chickenfan. Yours may miss a moult perhaps -can't remember that ever happening to us except for young birds. We have had some that didn't seem to do a full moult, just a few feathers, although they may have moulted so slowly I didn't notice. Also had some that dropped all their feathers in a week in December and froze! My wife knitted little Annie Blackrock a jumper, but she kept trying to take it off and getting tangled up, so we had to leave her to freeze and brought her into the house many times to warm her up when she ground to a halt and stood motionless.

Don't think the diet will do anything to start them off though. When they do start extra protein will speed the re-feathering. They don't get the insulation layer until the last part of feather growth, so keep a careful eye on them right through if they do moult late. The moult hits old birds really hard and they are the vulnerable ones. It is two one year olds though that are shivering at the moment and its 13 degrees here in the shade or 33 in the sun the thermometer says. The previous one feathered up in just a week though and laid the following week (Priscilla, a TNN).
 
I have two hybrids, now 18 months old, and one of them, a Leghorn hybrid, stopped laying and moulted in October/ November, having been in continuous lay since the previous October. She's just returned to lay in the last few days. The other one, a Columbian Blacktial, the same age, has gone on laying a daily egg since last October, a straight 14 months with no break, and shows no sign of stopping or moulting yet. My two 2.5-year-old purebreds have moulted this Autumn and still no sign of their return to lay. So its possible that yours may not even moult this winter, and it seems unnecessary to worry about it unless or until it does happen.
I would guess that it's partly to do with their breeding, with hybrid layers less inclined to moult at all in the winter after the year they were hatched, as this would be convenient for a farmer hoping for continuous egg production through the winter months. For purebreds, a moult at around 18 months would be more normal. And also, as Foxy suggests, on their age - in my limited experience, pullets don't moult in the Autumn/Winter of the year they were hatched, having moulted and re grown their feathers at around 14 weeks of age when they get their adult plumage.
I would continue with their normal layers diet, and ensure they have dry, wind proof shelter if they need it, whether in moult or not. If you give them a warm mash, do this in the late afternoon so they go to roost with full crops to last them through the long cold 15+ hour-long nights.
 
The birds that haven't moulted are a 18-month old French copper blue marans. One has moulted and now has a splendid new set of feathers, her sister now in faded feathers and still laying every other day. The others that haven't moulted are 18-month old hybrids (marans and magpie). They still lay an egg every day. I hope they can manage until spring in their old feathers.
 
Back
Top