silkie sexing

[hdowden]

if you have silkie chicks that need to be sexed place pics here. chicks need to be at least 4 weeks old. pics need to be from the sides of the head and full body, front veiw of the head, and any other pics you want to provide please. here are some tips i found online about sexing silkie chicks as well


Look at the feathers on the chick's head. Males tend to have feathers that stand upright and curve towards the back, while the female head feathers tend to form in a rounded feather puff.

Look at the comb when it develops within two to three weeks of the chick's birth. a male will have a larger comb than a female.

Males are significantly larger than females, and this can be obvious a few days after hatching. This isn't considered a certain method of sexing though because you may just have a large female or a small male. It's also a poor method if you are trying to compare chicks from two different genetic lines.

Listen for crowing. The chicks will start losing the fluffly baby feathers around four of five months. At that time a male silkie will start attempting to crow.

Look at the saddle feathers just before the tail and the hackle feathers on the neck. These feathers will be long and sharp on a male and gently rounded on a female.

 

[<3 N.C Chicken Chick <3]

Great that someone is starting this link. lol when I got my chicks ( I ended up with 2 hens 1 roo) there was one that was much smaller then the other too I thought oh hen right , wrong ! Thats how my roo got the name Sugie lol

 

[PoultryQueen29]

Thank you sooo much for starting this!!! I'm too impatient to wait and find out myself

These are a little over 4 months old:

Blue silkie

White silkie

Splash silkie

 

[ericsgirlie]

5 Weeks

#1- Mini. Very Tiny but sweet

#2 Tweetheart- Hoping for girl, but I have my doubts

#4 Curious George

#8 Shehuahua

10 Weeks

Shihuahua-

Mini

Curious George- So sweet, but we think roo

Mary Jane-

Tweetheart -

Darth Diva-

13 Weeks

Darth Diva

Mary Jane

Shehuahua

Tweetheart ( She has a single comb, I know not the best but she is so sweet) She has a very distinctive teet thus the name.

Curious George ( Youngest's favorite. I am sad... Pretty sure he is a Roo)

Mini

Group Shot ( Left To Right)
Mini, Mary Jane, Darth Diva, Curious George, Shehuahua, Tweetheart

 

[DanyB]

I’d really appreciate any help/ideas/guesses on the gender. I found it on my backyard when it was just couple days old according to my research. We live in the area with farms not too far and since it had some scuffs I assumed maybe it was dropped by a hawk who grabbed it from someone’s yard. I wasn’t able to find it’s original home and was in no way prepared to have a baby bird so I had to learn and improvise a lot lol This is my first chicken ever (I have raised rescue pigeon once from 2 days old and they don’t eat by them selves so I figured it can’t be much harder with a chick) and it’s the only one I have so I have no experience with chickens or any other chick to compare it to. Luckily I had a heating pad, boiled some eggs and went and bough chick starter, electrolytes and other supplies the next day. Thanks to google and especially this site I was able to figure out it’s breed (5 feathered toes and black skin) and age - it was tiny yellow ball of fluff! It’s cuddly but skittish/a bit shy at the same time. It tries to run away when some one comes close but it is friendly and likes to be around people at the same time. Often after a circle or two it stops running, does a little squat and lets you pick it up but screams and flaps it’s wings until it settles. Maybe it just doesn’t like to be picked up but it does love to nap on a shoulder or in a lap. It thinks I’m the mom so it screams soon as it looses my site. Follows me around often. It likes to be around people in general but tries to avoid being picked up. Seems like it’s always on allert, possibly because of how it ended up on my yard. About a week ago I noticed it’s comb changed a bit - it widened some and is not as smooth as it used to be, but no big bumps that I can see and it hasn’t changed much since, still looks pretty flat to me. I know it’s very young and early to tell for sure but I’m not on here for sure answers. Sometimes it all of a sudden stands tall and makes this loud call if some bird flies over, sometimes it squats down instead. It likes to pick seeds and weeds off the ground and of course it squats when its busy doing it, but it perks up to check on sounds and straightens it’s neck while in upright tall pose. If I’m laying in the grass, it’ll come and cuddle up to me, but if I reach out to pick it up, it’ll try to run away. Again, this is my first chicken so I assume I may be looking for signs of gender in what is actually totally normal behavior for both. Please don’t judge a newb haha I’m in love with it already but our hoa won’t allow Roos so I wish I could know early enough before I get completely attached. If there’s anything you’d like to know that may help with guesses, please ask away.

I may be wrong but it looks like a roo to me. See attached pic of my silkies. The gray one is a hen and the black one is a roo. Looking at their comb could help but I agree that silkies are very difficult to sex. For myself I didnt knew before one start crowing and the other start laying.

 

[Faraday40]

For myself I didnt knew before one start crowing and the other start laying.

Yep. That happens!

I thought my little EE was a tiny rooster. Very self-confident & friendly as a chick. "Tyrion" even had a male-ish color pattern, so we decided to keep him around until he crowed. Well, she laid a pretty blue eggs instead. Tyrion is now 7 years old and still laying. She's the top hen and puts any young cockerels in their place.

 

[cwieger]

I believe he is a cockerel. He has a prominent comb (which doesn't mean it's a boy, I've seen plenty of pullets with some bigger combs), and even though I can't say if I see streamers for sure, it looks like he may have hackles coming in. My bet is on boy. The white is much too young to tell.

Well, the verdict is in!! I guess it IS really difficult to sex a silkie! Turns out Betty our splash silkie is a hen! She gave us her first egg today!! Obviously it's the tiny one

 

[Varglet]

I only have two Silkies, one bearded, one non. Both are pullets; both have been caught laying eggs and both are currently sitting on eggs. They aren't good quality as far as I can tell (ordered them through a feed store), but that doesn't matter to me. They're my pets and my babies no matter what they look like.

This is the bearded one. And the pics are kind of old. At least a couple months maybe.

 

[Fancychooklady]

I wasn't offended by the comment. I was just saying that I personally don't care about her wattles, where most people probably would. Sometimes my straight forward way of talking/typing seems to have an offended tone to it, maybe?

But yeah, Yvonne's could probably go either way, in my opinion. May not know until you either get an egg or a crow.

Phew, I'm glad you weren't offended. I personally have never seen an ugly silkie, I think they are all gorgeous. With my line , red wattles mean roo. But never say never, my friend has a leghorn hen with 1 inch spurs. As you say, crow or egg!

 

[Fancychooklady]

Well, I caught my adult frizzle rooster trying to mount each of my 10 week old silkies I've been trying to sex. Should that be good enough to say they are female? Of course, I really wanted one rooster. Go figure. Ugh.

My rooster always knows long before I do.