primary | Better Hens and Gardens

Fast or Slow Molting Chickens?

In the last post (see Molting Chickens), I said that you could tell how long a chicken has been molting and how long it would continue to molt by looking at the primary (flight) feathers. But, I didn’t go on to explain how from there – as several have pointed out.

I’ll try to explain further with the help of the illustrations below (no comments on my attempt to illustrate a chicken wing!). The first illustration shows the 10 primaries (in yellow) of a chickens fully feathered wing prior to molting. For the explanations below, keep in mind that a bird drops [...]

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Clipping Chicken Wings (Flight Feathers)

I discovered rather suddenly that it’s sometimes necessary to trim a chicken’s wings so they can’t fly. We’d had Golden Buff hens for awhile when I decided to introduce a Barred Rock rooster, and because the hens never flew out of their pen, I was shocked when the rooster flew out (why a rooster would fly away from hens is explained in Introducing New Chickens). I had to clip his feathers to keep him in, and found out it’s a harmless and simple procedure.

Why (Not) to Clip Feathers

I think it’s best to leave the chicken’s wings alone unless there’s a [...]

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