#moulting ask

[askbirdbloggers]

I couldn't really find a solid answer on google. But my budgie had a night fright one night and lost some flight feathers on only one wing. He cant fly at all and just drops to the ground. How long will it take for those feathers to grow back? It's very sad to see him have such a hard time getting around since he can't fly very well.

There is no solid answer, if the feathers just broke, not completely fallen out at the base, it may take a few months for the body to decide to moult out the ends and grow new feathers.  If enough stress was put on the feathers they would be more likely to moult out faster since they’re more damaged and need replacing sooner. If the feathers completely fell out they should start regrowing relatively soon since there’s nothing there, the body knows it needs to regenerate it. There’s no real way to know, each bird is different and there’s a lot of factors such as diet, uv light exposure, season, and moulting cycle that can affect the rate at which feathers are replenished.  The more damaged they are the sooner they’ll moult out and regrow, that’s about as good of an answer as I can give you!

- Courtney (flock-talk)

[flock-talk]

hi! how can i tell if my bird is moulting? hes almost 5 months and i wanted to know because he seems to be steadily losing feathers, although its only noticable when I empty the cage pan. his favorite spot to be scratched was on the further back of his neck, too, and ive recently felt feathers there with hard shafts.

Feather quality, behaviour, and symmetry for the most part! 

If the feathers are broken, tattered, torn, splintered shafts, portions of filaments missing it’s a strong indicator that the bird had been chewing on them or ripping them out, keep in mind that some birds may chew feathers after they’ve been moulted so watch for freshly moulted ones to judge.  For behaviour a moulting bird should be relatively normal, they may be more moody, more tired, or a tad stressed but they shouldn’t be pacing, extremely fixated on certain feathers, over preening, being rough with the feathers or acting extremely out of character for the most part.  When the feathers moult they should be coming out so the one that moults out on the right also moults out on the left either on the same day or a few days later, plucking will produce spots and unevenness (this can sometimes be hard to tell with really rough moults).

I don’t think my birds have stopped moulting since spring and some birds have started back up again to grow in thick, healthy feathers to survive through the cold months so this is sounding to be about the right time for it. If feathers are dropping and they’re looking healthy it’s likely a moult, important to note that some diseases do cause sudden feather loss so if you’re not seeing new ones growing in, bald spots, signs of illness or anything too irregular do get them seen by a vet.

more in the moulting tag

[flock-talk]

My bird was preening her back and she was preening out some really dusty (it was so dusty I picked them up and there was dust on my fingers) white fluff feathers. some were also in kinda strands it was weird. Is this a molt thing? She has gotten some pinnies on her head so she might be going through a small molt. Shes a parrotlet so shes not a powder bird either

Parrotlets will still produce dust, all birds do, but having it come off of your hands to a noticeable degree is irregular for parrotlets.  If they’re that dusty where it leaves a layer on your fingers they either have a skin condition or aren’t bathing frequently enough.  The white strands are just degrading feather particles, typically down feathers breaking apart or just bits breaking off old feathers which is totally normal so long as it isn’t seeming to be excessive and producing visible breakage on the feathers.  Try offering baths more frequently, daily if possible, and encourage them to bathe or take her in to the shower to get some steam, if there is a lot of dust being produced it may be worth getting her seen by a vet just to ensure there isn’t a medical condition causing the increase in dust.

[flock-talk]

How much feather lost is normal for molting?

It really varies, you can have anything from a couple feathers a day to over 30 feathers a day (just a random number I guessed Zeeby probably lost yesterday). Determining whether or not a moult is normal is dependent is the health of the bird and the effect the moult is having on their body, are they still healthy otherwise, maintaining good temperature (not sitting fluffed up), not impeding flight, is the moult symmetrical (diseases and plucking will be asymmetrical), do the feathers look healthy, and things like that.

More on moults in the moulting tag

[flock-talk]

HOW LONG DO MOLTS LAST??? THIS MADNESS STARTED 2 MONTHS AGO!!

Depends on the type of bird and their ages, all birds have different moulting patterns and baby moults will go on a lot longer than adult moults (some larger birds can take a few years to fully finish the baby moults).

Using parrotlets as a specific example, their baby moult can last  a few months if they’re spring babies, if they’re ready to moult in the winter their moult can last for around 5 or more months. Since the body needs to retain heat rather than wasting energy making new feathers they will moult out at a much slower rate.  The rest of their lives they typically have two separate moults, fall and spring, the one for the fall will be replacing insulating feathers or severely damaged ones and they may grow thicker or more plentiful down feathers to retain heat, the spring moult will be replacing feathers that got damaged during the winter as well as dropping down feathers or developing thinner ones to cope with the heat.  These adult seasonal moults should only last about 1-2 months but can become irregular and last longer than they’re supposed to.

There’s a lot of things that affect moults and most captive birds will have very irregular moults due to the information received by the pineal gland, things like temperature, lighting and diet affect whether or not the gland decides it’s moulting season. Since we control nearly all of their environmental factors we can cause the moults to start early or late and end up having really short or extremely longer moults than usual. Other things like the state of the feathers, clipping, overall health of the bird, and species will affect the moult as well. This previous post goes over that in more detail.

[flock-talk]

how long does it take for all of a healthy birds feathers to mount out? Im kinda curious to get a read on when Suelos stressbars/discoloration/dull feathers might have started showing up. he's also got a a bunch of new yellow-orange pinnies coming in and its really great to see. I haven't spotted a green pinnie yet... any ideas as to why? thanks so much you're really amazing and I'm not doing so great but your birds always cheer me up :)

It varies quite a bit from bird to bird, environmental factors and things like stress bars, discolouration and broken feathers all moult out at different rates.  Feathers which are damaged, broken, or have a weak structure will moult out faster as the body sort of knows those feathers are weak, in order to maintain flight, warmth and overall health the body will replace the weakest or oldest feathers sooner than others.  Birds who pluck out their feathers tend to have feathers grow back slower and in severe cases not at all because the follicle either gets damaged or the body just decides to stop growing feathers where they keep getting ripped out. With senegals a full body moult, a typical baby moult, can last around 5-7 months on average but adults moult at a much slower rate than babies do and will usually not dump out every single feather at once.  Adult moults are usually around 1-2 months where they replace the most crucial feathers and will lose the rest throughout the year as they need replacing, some may still carry over to the next years, this will vary depending on a lot of factors.  Birds moult according to a sort of schedule or clock in their pineal gland, this gland is an organ which perceives light and tells the bird when it’s time to moult.  These glands are set to different times and schedules in different species as they all moult according to when food is most plentiful, whatever the lighting is like during those seasons will typically trigger moults.  In captivity moulting can become quite irregular, should they not get full spectrum lighting their gland can not register things correctly, moults may be shorter than they should, moults could happen sporadically, or they can go on for much longer than they’re supposed to simply because the gland is not getting the correct information from it’s environment.  Due to this irregular lighting birds may not moult out as many feathers in one moulting season like they should, they may retain feathers until later in the year or until the next year.

On average small/ smaller-medium parrots will replace every feather every two years give or take a few depending on environmental and dietary conditions.

[flock-talk]

Hey! I have a couple questions. -I bought two of my budgies with very clipped wings. After a few months one of them can fly without problem but her poor friend is still stuck on the ground. Do you have any idea why his feathers haven't grown back? -My three budgies all peck at each other and have been fighting over food, toys, etc. I thought about getting a bigger cage so they could separate but they sit close together most of the time anyway. No injuries, but is this normal? Thanks a lot! :D

Clipped feathers take longer to moult out than regular feathers, no one particularly knows why that is just yet, it likely has something to do with the cleanness of the cut and the body not recognizing the feather as damaged.  The rate at which they moult out will depend on plenty of factors, the age of the bird, the quality of the feather, and their overall health/ diet.  Older birds will moult out feathers slower than young birds because young ones have to go through a huge baby moult which replenishes every baby feather in a short period of time while adults will be regulating feather health throughout the year and moulting out at a slower rate.  If a bird has poor nutrition the feathers would also be moulting out a lot faster as the body will replace feathers as they become weak, poorer the nutrition the weaker the feathers the more frequently they’ll need to be replaced.  It can also depend on when the bird was clipped, if one budgie had them clipped right after a moult he’ll have to go through a whole moulting cycle to regrow them than a bird who had them cut prior to a moult.

Budgies may bicker from time to time but they should not be fighting, if they are they may require larger housing, more toys, more things to hide behind, multiple food bowls, or possibly separating the birds.  The budgies’ sexes and age will also play a role in this aggression, breeding hormones play a major part in aggression levels and females are more prone to fighting than males are. The season and lack of flight feathers will also affect this, seasonal hormones and general grumpiness from moulting will cause irritability and without the ability to fly away from one another birds are more prone to fighting as the option of flying away from an uncomfortable situation no longer exists giving them no other choice but to fight.

If you upgrade them to a larger cage, give them plenty more toys to play with and at least one food/ water bowl per bird and there is still no change it is best to separate them for their health and safety.  Even if the aggression just decreases a small bit but there’s still tension between them there will be unnecessary amounts of stress on the birds which can make them very ill.