Can feel my Silkies bones underneath?

[louis73]

My 12 week old Silkie is looking like it's not growing very much. I picked it up today and I could feel it's (breast??) bone underneath. It sticks out quite a lot. Is that normal for a Silkie? I'm a bit concerned because it lives with some bossy sussex and it seems to get to the food but it definitely has to wait it's turn. Also a week ago I switched them to cracked grain. The two Silkies don't seem that interested. I had them on chick starter before that but they seemed to lose interest in that once I started feeding them scraps so I asked the local produce store and they said the grain was fine at this age? When I first integrated them I separated the Silkies from the sussex but after a few weeks and some initial running around together they seem to get on for the most part. There are a lot of feathers in the run too but do the silkies lose baby feathers? Anyone got any info? Any thoughts would be appreciated.

 

[Sonoran Silkies]

By cracked grain, do you mean corn? or scratch? Okay as a very small portion of their diet as a treat, but is NOT a good food. Chickens should be fed starter/grower until they are laying.

If the silkies have a true walnut comb (as compared with a modified rose comb), they will have a noticeably breast ridge. It is an effect of the pea comb gene.

 

[louis73]

Cracked grains. I went back to the produce today and bought some more chick starter and some pollard (this helps them to put on weight?) to mix with it. The lady at the produce says my chickens are just being fussy. I have put out an extra feeder as well. I think it is a walnut comb. Is that the comb that looks like a brain? And it may be a rooster, bit hard to tell yet. The other chickens are chasing the two Silkies away a lot but when I separate them, the silkies seem to want to join the others because they just hang around the fence line. Thanks for your help. It's so hard to know what to feed them. There is so much information out there. Kind of like when you first have kids....