The Silver Laced Wyandotte Thread

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SLWs are one of the few breeds that I'm being really picky about where I get them from. I have an incubator, have a brooder, or have a small coop to house a trio. Where would you get some really good SLWs from? Is Jerry Foley the only one? My chickens are mainly just a fun hobby, but I would like to breed my trio of Lavender Orpingtons and also SLWs.
Heading to the NE Poultry Congress in West Springfield next Saturday. Maybe I'll get some local leads!! :)
Sarah
 
NanaKat said:
Besides the feather lacing and the nice tent on the hen, I really like the wide heads and lovely combs that have nice shape and texture. Of great importance is how the combs follow the contour of the head and especially the point on the cock's comb.
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Thank you for the kind words. I think they have good heads, but there is much I would like to fix about them. My largest focus in the next generation will be correct leg color. Neither display vivid orange, and the hen even has dark spotting on her legs. My next goal will be to decrease the amount of thigh fluff. I think the cockerel may be able to aid in that area, since I find his thighs more acceptable than the pullet's.

 
I wanted to make a post for those new to SLW and looking to get quality birds. The difference in good quality birds and hatchery stock are so vast that I wish they would call the hatchery stock something else entirely. Most of them end up looking like a Black Sexlink with a weak Silver Laced Wyandotte paint job. I have owned both.

I fell in love with SLW when I started keeping chickens again over a year ago and it took me a lot of time and money to finally end up with SLW that I love sipping coffee and watching peck around the yard. I just wanted to share these pics so that you can see the difference of good quality stock vs hatchery grade. You don't need to wait until your SLW are full grown to start over like I did.

These are some of the first SLW I bought from a local breeder. At this point I was full of hope for beautiful SLW.



After waiting through the summer and feeding them up this is what I ended up with. Not the image of a SLW that I had in mind.



After three different batches (one of them expensive) I procured some Foley birds and this is what the juveniles are looking like. Amazing how early you can see the difference in quality. The bird is very young, but see how much white there is? The lacing is already very apparent.







Should end up looking much closer to the Silver Laced Wyandotte parents.



I have even noticed a big difference in the newborn chicks. Many of them almost look grey with chipmunk stripes instead of black with chipmunk stripes. If you get really dark chicks you may want to try another batch from a different breeder.
(the two in the back are not SLW) Notice how light these chicks are from a Foley pair of SLW.


I hope this is helpful and I hope you enjoy Silver Laced Wyandotte as much as I do. Happy Hatching!
 
Great post sidewing. I also started with hatchery silver laced, and in fact still keep them to show others as a comparison. I will comment on your observations about chick down. I receive a decent variation in down colors, with some being lighter and others darker. It may just be for my strain, but I have noticed that most lighter downed chicks turn out to be male. I have only done one season of serious record keeping to check, but found surprisingly accurate results and look to explore this further. It may be a large help to me in the future. I mention this though to say those chicks with darker down do not always indicate a lower quality bird, and viewing parent stock or noting incoming feathers as they grow is a better way to tell. The pullet I shared above had darker down as a chick
 
forgetful said:
Great post sidewing. I also started with hatchery silver laced, and in fact still keep them to show others as a comparison. I will comment on your observations about chick down. I receive a decent variation in down colors, with some being lighter and others darker. It may just be for my strain, but I have noticed that most lighter downed chicks turn out to be male. I have only done one season of serious record keeping to check, but found surprisingly accurate results and look to explore this further. It may be a large help to me in the future. I mention this though to say those chicks with darker down do not always indicate a lower quality bird, and viewing parent stock or noting incoming feathers as they grow is a better way to tell. The pullet I shared above had darker down as a chick
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That would be very interesting! I have not tracked it yet since I'm only hatching a couple at a time to build up my stock. When I get the chance I will start tracking that. Great observation Forgetful.
 
YAY!!! Picked up my first SLW's today! Only been waiting years for these chickens (they were the chickens I actually sort of thought were cool before I even admitted I liked chickens).

They're from Bill Guardhouse in Ontario, Canada. Picked them up at the Northeast Poultry Congress today. Fun times :)
400
 
Hey everyone! i just jumped on the post to find out where i can buy breeding stock of these beautiful SLWs. Im really looking to get in touch with a breeder before a hatchery. im looking for a strain that is beautiful as the standard but hens that lay like champs and the roosters pack on the meat. Can anyone point me in the right direction?
 

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