Pretty quickly after getting our silkies we realized a big downside of the breed…. Their wonderful, silky, hair like feathers, occasionally get in the way of their eyes.
Two of our five silkies especially had limited vision (Muppet and Elmer). Our plan was to free range them and they were already at a disadvantage in general add in not being able to see. We figured it was pretty important a couple of them get a haircut before freedom.
However pretty soon after our efforts were in vain as the feathers quickly grew back. So we were back to square one.
Our next idea was hair ties! We got some really tiny hair bands and attempted to give two of them ponytails. Which mostly worked……! For all of five minutes… They had almost immediately made it their life’s mission to free themselves of the ties. Boy were they determined!
Well if hair ties doesn’t work what if….we try zip ties? The zip ties helped make things stay in place while allowing us to tighten it beyond what a hair tie could do. Of course when putting the ties in we were super careful! Luckily this idea has worked…… mostly.
Elmer happens to be a master of freeing herself from ties of all kinds. Muppet’s however was still in! Her Afro was the most problematic for her vision of the group. In trying to get it out of her eyes we actually discovered she has lovely brown eyes. Right now with how her zip tie is we can tell if it’s still in if we can see her eyes.
Funnily enough as we’ve run into the wet season in the PNW they’ve actually been able to see better. They oddly like hanging out in the rain? Which is at least nice because when wet their hair doesn’t cover nearly as much of their vision. (This pic is just from our coop cam so the quality is severely lacking lol)
I figured I’d post this as an idea for anyone else who might need some hair control ideas for their silkies. When we were experimenting we didn’t really find others who had tried the same method of zip ties. Good luck hope this helps someone!
Two of our five silkies especially had limited vision (Muppet and Elmer). Our plan was to free range them and they were already at a disadvantage in general add in not being able to see. We figured it was pretty important a couple of them get a haircut before freedom.
However pretty soon after our efforts were in vain as the feathers quickly grew back. So we were back to square one.
Our next idea was hair ties! We got some really tiny hair bands and attempted to give two of them ponytails. Which mostly worked……! For all of five minutes… They had almost immediately made it their life’s mission to free themselves of the ties. Boy were they determined!
Well if hair ties doesn’t work what if….we try zip ties? The zip ties helped make things stay in place while allowing us to tighten it beyond what a hair tie could do. Of course when putting the ties in we were super careful! Luckily this idea has worked…… mostly.
Elmer happens to be a master of freeing herself from ties of all kinds. Muppet’s however was still in! Her Afro was the most problematic for her vision of the group. In trying to get it out of her eyes we actually discovered she has lovely brown eyes. Right now with how her zip tie is we can tell if it’s still in if we can see her eyes.
Funnily enough as we’ve run into the wet season in the PNW they’ve actually been able to see better. They oddly like hanging out in the rain? Which is at least nice because when wet their hair doesn’t cover nearly as much of their vision. (This pic is just from our coop cam so the quality is severely lacking lol)
I figured I’d post this as an idea for anyone else who might need some hair control ideas for their silkies. When we were experimenting we didn’t really find others who had tried the same method of zip ties. Good luck hope this helps someone!
