Bald hen

[virgil]

One of my hens has lost most of her feathers over the past week. All three of them have stopped laying and the bald one is spending most of her time in the coop. Is this due to the weather? I'm not sure whether she is moulting or whether she or the others are pulling the feathers out. She's not at the bottom of the pecking order and so wouldn't expect her to be being picked on

Don't worry, they're just moulting I'll wager. Hens stop laying while they're moulting as they need the proteins to build the feathers. I had one once that moulted entirely in the space of a week, in November. I had to keep her indoors next to the fire for three weeks.

Thanks duchesse, should I be moving them inside if they don't have feathers to keep themselves warm? We have three hens in an eglu cube which can take ten and so I've been worried anyway about them being cold.

Have you been letting them out of their coop later in the day in this weather? It's the fall in number of daylight hours that causes them to start moulting, so they normally don't do it until late summer/autumn. If they've been staying in later that could explain the moulting. Also they will stop laying if daylight drop below 14 hours, which they easily could if you've been letting them out later in the day. I have a light in my coops, on a timer, that boosts their daylight from early winter onwards (after they've finished moulting) and brings them back ito lay. You only need about 25W or low energy equivalent to simulate daylight for them.

sounds like moulting.

do keep an eye out for any of the others pecking at her, though.

If they do, spray her with Purple Spray (that's its name, you can usually find it in shops that sell horse stuff )

yes, agree with duchesse - it's daylight now at about 5, so try to let them out that early.

they don't need to be inside in bad weather - just make sure they've got places to shelter.

tbh it honest whether you move her indoors depends how cold it gets especially at night. 3 hens in an eglu could keep it quite warm when they're tucked up at night I would think. Have you got an old blanket or something you could lay over the eglu to insulate it a bit more at night?

Some people fashion <a class="break-all" href="http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=i8.photobucket.com/albums/a12/mummyhen/img020.jpg&imgrefurl=www.thepoultrygarden.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f%3D90%26t%3D6112&h=684&w=800&sz=141&tbnid=ERohagoDOu0BnM:&tbnh=105&tbnw=123&zoom=1&docid=UbuoODfgG6HUwM&sa=X&ei=D8efT5izH43P4QSdxZCzAw&ved=0CHQQ9QEwBA&dur=358" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">little jackets for balding chickens. You can make them out of fleece. My experience of that is that they don't really like them much tbh. Although if she's choosing to stay indoors she might well be cold and you could either bring her in or make her a jumper.

We don't shut up the cube at night (although do lock up the fox proof run). The Run is covered at the moment to give them a bit more shelter from the rain but we open up the run at about 7.30 in the morning so that they can free range in an area which is about 50 square metres but has a lot of trees and shrubs and so is pretty shady.
Might have to see whether I can make a hen jacket

Ahh hang on though, because of the snow and cold over the winter we moved the cube and the run inside a barn. They had natural light but also artificial light in thee and so has far more light than they would ordinarily have over the winter. We moved them back out a few weeks ago. Maybe they are getting less light now than they were in the barn

Could well be that! Give it a few weeks and they'll start laying again. Make sure they're getting really good food and the feathers will grow back faster.

Chickens in jumpers - that's made me smile :)

One of my girls started losing feathers last November time and I was assured she was simply moulting, but she didn't go completely bald - neither did she re-grow her feathers though. A couple of the others have recently started losing a feather or two but none of them look ill, in fact they're as perky and cheeky as ever. Turns out they could have mites or lice or something equally yukky, so we doused them all in powder yesterday. What fun! Will do that for a couple of weeks and see what happens.

They give me hours of pleasure 'cos they're such characters so I want to get them sorted.