by Pajarita » Fri Jan 12, 2018 11:17 am
Welcome to the forum! Going by the pictures you posted, she is either plucking herself or the other bird is doing it but, in my personal opinion, it is definitely plucking.
Now, what could be causing this?
1. Extreme color mutations [as in green birds that end up white like yours], can be a product of inbreeding and inbreeding causes not only physical deformities but also 'weak minds' and 'weak minds' are much more susceptible to the chronic stress that makes them pluck [and get stress bars].
2. If she was molting in the winter, there is something going on that shouldn't with her endocrine system -an endocrine system out of whack messes up everything in their bodies and it's also a cause of chronic stress.
3. If the other bird is a male and he is sexually frustrated [messed up endocrine system would do this, especially if added to a high protein diet], it could be him who is plucking her.
I have a male/female bonded pair of plets [Paquita is a Lucinda phenotype and Rajah is a turquoise Pacific]. I had originally given the female [which had been plucking for years] to a friend of mine with the condition that he had to find her a mate. He tried but couldn't find any to rehome so I got an ex-breeder for him. They seem to do well for a time, she had even stopped plucking but something went wrong and he started attacking her and she started plucking. What went wrong, I don't know but they had to be separated and Paquita continued plucking in earnest. After my friend died, Michael [the Parrot Wizard and owner of this site] flew down to North Carolina to pick them up and bring them to me [this friend was a moderator in this site]. They came in separate cages but I put them back together immediately and Rajah never attacked her and she never plucked so, although Wolf [the friend] claimed to have done what I am doing, maybe he was not as strict as I am because they get along very well, he never attacks her and she is now fully feathered and looking beautiful.
Now, if I had to venture a guess, I would say that the problem with plets that don't get along and/or pluck and/or have stress bars is due to inadequate husbandry. Plets, like all other aviary small species, seem to be extremely opportunistic breeders [read: they become overly hormonal and sexually frustrated very easily] so they need to be kept at a strict solar schedule with full exposure to dawn and dusk and fed a low protein diet with lots of fruits and leafy greens [they LOVE leafy greens!] ergo, they cannot be free-fed any protein food [seeds, pellets, nutriberries, avicake, etc - mine eat gloop and raw produce for breakfast and half a heaping tablespoon of a good quality budgie mix each for dinner]. My recommendation to you is to re-evaluate your husbandry in terms of light schedule and diet. Oh, and I would also get rid of that sleeping hut this time of the year and only use it during breeding season.