Moulting now?

[Cab]

Matilda (rhode rock hybrid) was POL when we got her at Easter, and has been a good'un producing eggs since a fortnight afterwards. Took a couple of weeks off with being broody, she was a persistent broody for a hen so young, but she's been a really good layer all year.

She's stopped over the last few years and I suspected she was heading in to a molt - this morning it looks like someone put a grenade in a bag of feathers in the hen house. She's looking just a little ragged.

We're heading in to the coldest part of the year now. She's got plenty of friends to snuggle with at night, but is there anything else I can do to keep her warm? Never had a hen start to moult at such a silly time before!

 

[chrismahon]

Our little Annie Blackrock did exactly the same Cab, lost all her feathers in a few days. My wife knitted a wooly jumper for her, in black so she didn't stand out, to try an keep her warm. Annie refused to wear it and kept getting tangled trying to get it off. So that's not a route I would suggest. So as a result we watched her very carefully. She often stood on one leg shivering and when she got too bad we took her in for a warm in the house for half an hour. It took her ages to feather up -perhaps 3 months, by which time it was Spring and warm. A high protein diet is required so perhaps take her on one side and treat her to sunflower hearts. If she doesn't move around much she won't grind up whole sunflower seeds. Danger sign is standing motionless with both legs down and not shivering -that's hypothermia. We had a cock develop that in heavy snow and it took him 3 days to recover. You need to keep her out of the wind, so make sure she has somewhere to go that is outside but dry and windless. Easier said than done I know.

 

[Cab]

Cheers Chris.

The run is good and sheltered so wind and rain shouldn't be a problem - not unless we get freakish weather like last Saturday again

And she's not one to stand out in the uncovered part of the run getting wet (like my goldline Mary).

I'll keep an eye on her and look out for troubling signs of cold. And she'll take food from the hand readily enough so getting her some personal treats won't be hard.