Hi. I have 5 silkies.

[anatess]

I want to go straight to asking my question but it was suggested I introduce myself first.

So, I'm anatess. I have 5 silkies. I live in the city zoned residential so I'm limited with my chickens. For example, I can't have a rooster, so when my silkie that I thought was a girl cuckadoodle-doo'd at 7am, I had to make him an indoor chicken. He's the cutie on my avatar picture. He free ranged in my house but I realized this was a terrible idea because he got sick and passed away not even a month after being indoors. I don't know what happened. My husband said something about teflon being lethal to chickens and I did use my little el-cheapo teflon pan a couple times to heat potpourri.

Anyway, I have 5 hens ranging in age from 6 months to a year but I only get 1 egg every other day, and the rare day that I get 2. So, I'm wondering if my chickens are not happy. So that's why I'm here.

 

[chameleon]

I don't have any experience with silkies, but I just want to say hi and

So sorry about your cutie that passed away.

You will find many friendly, helpful people here to share your chicken stories with and answer all your questions.

 

[redsoxs]

Greetings from Kansas, anatess, and

! Happy you joined our community! I also have zero experience with silkies, their laying habits, etc. But I know the folks in the silkies thread in this link do: https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/297632/silkie-thread
Hope they can help you out! best wishes and thanks for joining BYC!

 

[micah wotring]

Welcome to BYC! I'm afraid I'm still working out the egg laying thing myself so I can't be much help.

Hope you enjoy it here though!

Make it a great day!

~Micah

 

[snow5164]

Hello and welcome ,
So sorry about your silkie rooster , so you know they are a sensitive breed , I had one have a heart issue and die because the rooster kept chasing her....

My 7 month old silkie hasn't laid and egg yet ... not sure when she will. They aren't great layers , definitely not a hardy breed.

We built a little 6x6 foot room for our silkies because the other hens were scaring them .

Have fun

 

[chickenweirdo1]

Great to have another poultry lover! A Silkie is only good for about 0-2 eggs a week.

 

[snow5164]

I want to go straight to asking my question but it was suggested I introduce myself

Anyway, I have 5 hens ranging in age from 6 months to a year but I only get 1 egg every other day, and the rare day that I get 2.  So, I'm wondering if my chickens are not happy.  So that's why I'm here.

At 6 months you could have more roosters

, just saying my 7 month olds have not crowed or laid an egg yet!!!

What size egg did you get? Can you post it with a quarter beside it ?? I'd like to see what to expect , I'm scared I won't find the teeny, tiny eggs

 

[N F C]

Sorry about your rooster. Silies aren't known for their egg laying abilities, they're more for looks and pets. If you want more eggs, look for something like the red or black sex links, Leghorns, Australorps, or Rhode Island Reds. Here's a link to a good article in the Learning Center on characteristics by breed:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/...cken-guide-to-picking-backyard-chicken-breeds

Best of luck to you!

 

[Ol Grey Mare]

Welcome to BYC!
As noted above, silkies are, generally speaking, more of a decorative breed than a production breed - so even if all your birds are female (as noted, that is not necessarily a given for this breed) such spotty production is not really indicative of anything being wrong at all. As long as your birds have appropriate housing, good nutrition and lots of fresh clean water it is unlikely anything you are doing is making your birds unhappy or effecting their production.

 

[anatess]

Thank you so much for the warm welcome! I love this site!

I'm not really in it for the eggs (although, they are exciting... it's like winning money on a scratch-off ticket, hah hah). They're my kids' pets. I have kids who grew up on Crocodile Hunter and Bindi the Jungle Girl and so they're slowly transforming my house into a zoo to get some close encounters with animals that they love. Usually we study and read up on the breed before we take one home but a friend of mine told us about her silkie farm (she's breeding silkies for show) so we went and took a trip to visit. Well, while we were there she showed us some babies and my son noticed one of them couldn't stand up. So my friend took the chick out from the pen and set him in a box and told us he's going to be culled because he's not gonna make it. Well, on our way to the car, I found the chick in my son's jacket pocket and he insisted he can take care of it and the chick will be just fine. The little chick lived for almost a month before she died. But then I realized these things are magical creatures - you start with one and all of a sudden you look and you got 6...