black meat breeds, silkies ect....

[exop]

Years ago when I was new to poultry, I thought I would try to work on a larger, meat oriented version of the Silkie by crossing several heritage breeds, and I looked into all this stuff.

The more I found out, the more concerned I became about the state of the original breeds themselves. Far from being an indefinitely durable resource that one can always draw on for useful genetics, a heritage breed is always at the mercy of a lot of stupid, thoughtless breeders and callous hatcheries, who often are not very interested in a breed's genetic continuity and useful, distinct features. There are good breeders, and honorable hatcheries out there, and it's thanks to these folks that many breeds survive in a recognizable form today.

But: a lot of hobby breeders are interested in either A. pets; unintentionally breeding out useful instincts, survival traits, and natural wariness; or in B. exhibition, obsessing over a Standard of Perfection or in other words, the idea of perfect beauty. And hatcheries are famous for a bias - conscious or not - towards birds that lay a lot of eggs, have high hatchability and in the worst case scenario, may cross in other breeds to get there. I have heard a joke about one hatchery who offers a lot of different breeds... but they all look a little like a Leghorn.

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You are so right, not good for the chicken... not just because it's going to be eaten, but because the Silkie itself is in some trouble IMHO. It's so fun to make new types of Silkie... new colors, crossed with ornamental breeds; extra meaty ones, crossed with meat breeds; extra fancy ones, bred with a teetering posture and a crest which seriously impairs the vision. No-one seems to have taken the breed seriously enough to consider it a candidate for conservation breeding. Someone north of me raises and sells "silkies" that look exactly like a furry, cushion combed black cochin and are almost the same size... you see them showing up at the local 4H fairs.

 

[laughingdog]

@exop, that was a concern of mine, as i dont at all see any of the silkies kept for thousands of years, anymore. even the five toes, which as a boy, thought were weird and why have five fully developed toes, are all stunted and called the standard of perfection, and comb typed and skin color are debatable apparently now, as maybe debate able because maybe not even looked for under fluff. heck im mostl just wanting some eggs to try hatching, or a pair to see how theydo, and most want an arm and a leg for these new feathered variety of silkies.. i was under the impression you shouldn see feather shafts/quills or feathers on a silkie at all. ???

 

[exop]

Laughingdog, sounds like you and I are of the same mind on this and looking for the same thing. If I ever find a classic silkie I will let you know.

My hope is that one of the many hatcheries out there has some "unimproved" stock.

The modern American ball-of-fluff birds are pretty variable - so fluffy that it almost seems people aren't bothering to select for a consistent body shape underneath there. I have several different colors of these ornamental Silkies from one breeder who is supposed to have pretty good birds, but when you look at them next to each other it's almost like there are 4 different breeds in size, shape and the way they stand. Some have more of the Silkie traits than others. People must not care very much about keeping the sky blue earlobe, or the truly black skin, and yes, those stunted, shriveled outside toes are everywhere (brachydactyly). I think it was bred in along with the extra foot feathering.

White colored Silkies are more likely to have had less things done to them genetically - I think some of the biggest changes came when people tried to make new colors.

 

[laughingdog]

thats why i like the classic black, and actully see better quality classic standard silkies when out crossed to cochins oddly, so must be alot of mixing in the blood for that to happen. im hearing alot of six toes popping up on th silkies, and sounds neat to see, but breedsrs cull these birds that are otherwise perfect, and if was that big deal, just amputae toe when born.. or is that a no no for showing if you were honest about it when breeding and selling? oddly even giving your birds a haircut is DQ, which seems cruel as its a bird designed for the cold, and told some just drop dead in summer out in barns and pens/coops. but i admit the look is kinda sadly adorable in some ways, though id be syling the hair i interesting ways for my own amusement. plus always heard silkies had such great sccess and always raisd all of however may chicks, even aded ones besides ther own, but now hearing the smother, squish, and have horrible fertility, hatchablity, and poulting out of their own young. ths breed would never have been kept, if was like this back in old days. een a few auctions that had classic silkies and the were cheaper as no one wants them anymore, and sad a good breed is going the way of most dog breeds: fragile, sized down fr modern cage keping constantly, and about as useful as teets on turtles. itd be nice to have some useful animals if we actually had to go back to living off of ourselves, and not just rely on every other country to provide sub standards for work we are to lazy and cheap to do ourselves (and i mean most "modern" countries now a days, not just usa). rant over.. i just woke up. lol

 

[jdopler]

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Are there any American breeders for the Ayam Cemani or the Yeonsan Ogye ?

there are a few, hard to find tho... and I don't know their pricing could be pretty high. I am working on getting some this fall, pm me and I can share more info.

 

[Kassaundra]

I know this is an older thread, but I was wanting to mark it so I could read in more detail later.

Is the dark flesh a dominant gene?

The flesh isn't dark all the way through? Just the edges that touch the skin? Did I understand that correctly?

 

[shadowpaints]

we are on our 3rd generation, we started with a few large silkies they were about 5-6 lbs. then we crossed with the biggest cochin roo i could find, and crossed back with a silkie roo.

they have black skin, black meat and black bones. as well as their intestines and other innards... all black or dark grey. makes for a AWESOME halloween dinner LOL tastes just as good as regular old chicken

 

[Kev]

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Finally, someone else who does this!

It's a hit but most won't even TRY it...

pic for above poster:

 

[Svarthona]

There's a wide range of colors. There are birds which are indeed black/verydark all over - skin, flesh, membranes, the whole insides basically. But those purebred birds seem to be very rare, regardless of which black fleshed breed it is.
I've even heard of sikies here in Sweden with perfectly dark skin not having dark flesh. Those were likely mixed with something else at one time and the breeders didn't select for dark flesh afterwards. Which is sad but kind of makes sense I think. You can just test the quality of the flesh darkness of a project bird when the bird is kitchen ready > then it's too late to use it for breeding, obviously lol. And many silky owners don't eat their birds anyways, so from such a mixed-line you could get anything.
My own farm mixes have a decent amount of svarthöns in them and I don't think I ever hatched two which were exactly the same, when judging the darkness of their insides. I got partially black skin with white meat, white skin with partially black meat, black skin and light flesh with some darker patches, black skin and dark flesh but light insides & membranes etc etc. The combinations seem endless and I'm starting to think that there are different genes for skin, eye, flesh and membrane color. Closely linked, but not really one entirely reliable dominant gene iykwim. Just seems to be more complex than that. At least that's what I am suspecting since the different expressions split up so much after some generations of mixing them with "regular" chickens. I am getting the full rainbow of combinations and even the exact shade of the dark skin varies. Black skin, blue skin, purpleish skin, gray skin, green skin (dark over yellow, which was an entertaining color) and this year I even got a brown pullet with brown legs and brownish skin.
When you're starting such a project

expect the unexpected and be prepared to cross back to the original black breed for quite a while... which may defeat the purpose of crossing in something else for size. Somehow the darkest birds I hatch, always seem to be the smallest ones

 

[ESofVA]

I have a couple of Silkie x projects I have just started on. Both are more along the lines of color but also of feather type...not necessarily hookless, but very fluffy.
I .started out planning on both color and silkie feathers. After doing a LOT of experimental crosses on the chicken calculator I began to realize that is was going to take a gazillion hatched chicks and a million crosses (not literally..it just seemed like it but really multiple hundreds) for the probability of getting just 1 right or close to right chick!). My F1 chicks started hatching, they stated coloring up and I am REALLY pleased with a couple of the colors. I have since regrouped my thoughts/plans and this is where I am with a few of my chicks...but not all necessarily that I am keeping. I think the hardest part is selling the remaining chicks.










These pics were taken right around Mother's Day ( the roses from my oldest son were on the same card! ). and almost all have good beards, muffs, topknots, and are quite fluffy, esp since they are a bit older now.