Chicken Breed Focus - Silkie

[Sylvester017]

Never dumb ! If you don't ask , you can't learn.

There are many beautiful silkies being shown at country fairs and poultry expos all over the world.
I will be taking some of mine to our country show this weekend for the ' animal nursery. The kids love them.

Hi - nice that you can show your cuties! Our county fair here in the state had no poultry because of the AI scare this year - not any livestock whatsoever but then it was merciful not to have them shown this year. We had an unusually miserable and long humid summer/fall. Still, a county fair with no animals isn't really a county fair. A lot of breeders and hatcheries closed down shipping earlier this year and many had to thin down their flocks because they couldn't ship their hatches into several states.

i dont know much about silkies but last week i ordered a black one from murray mcmurray hatchery. i cant wait to pick them up!!!

I hope you enjoy your little Black Silkie. I have one little Black hen. She's almost 4 yrs old and still my best layer - even better than my LF. But boy is she LOUD! My Partridge Silkie is so quiet I never know she's layed until I check the nestboxes. How can my littlest Black Silkie also be my noisy-est bird! But I LUV her to pieces - maybe because she's our funniest smartest cutest little chicken! I think she might be neurotic too since she has OCD scratching the bottom of nestboxes until she lays her egg. She had scratched the bottom of the old coop's wood nestbox so hard she lost a couple toenails making them bleed so we had to put plexiglass bottoms in the boxes to keep her from picking up splinters. The vet wasn't concerned about the missing nails since they were on her outer toe each foot but I have noticed she doesn't get up and down the new ladder ramp very well without those extra toesnails to grip the ramp cleats. Still she manages to get up and down the ladder when we put a crate next to the ladder so she can take an intermittent hop onto the crate to go up the ladder the rest of the way.

Our Black "Mini" chicken. Her name is Minmae ("Mini") which means clever black pearl. It's funny how after we name a chicken that it happens to fit the personality.

 

[Adorkable]

Blue chicks



Splash cockerel


Beautiful silkies and great pics everyone!

Just sharing a few pics to see if this thread goes on my profile page instead of my subscriptions

 

[Adorkable]

This silly little mixed color pullet started laying eggs (which I collected every day) and laid eggs for about a week. Then she decided to go broody and sit on a nest of imaginary eggs for about 2 months! She went out every morning to do her business, eat, drink, and dust bathe then back on her empty nest. There were eggs that the other pullets laid inside the nest box, but she would always go to her empty little corner of imaginary eggs... silly girls

She just got over her broody spell yesterday thank goodness!

 

[Sylvester017]

This silly little mixed color pullet started laying eggs (which I collected every day) and laid eggs for about a week. Then she decided to go broody and sit on a nest of imaginary eggs for about 2 months! She went out every morning to do her business, eat, drink, and dust bathe then back on her empty nest. There were eggs that the other pullets laid inside the nest box, but she would always go to her empty little corner of imaginary eggs... silly girls

She just got over her broody spell yesterday thank goodness!

It's always a guess on my part whether a Silkie is broody or just hiding out because of molting. My Silkies don't lose a bunch of feathers or grow a bunch of quills all at one time -- it seems like an on-going intermittent process so sometimes they really ARE broody and other times they are just being reclusive because molting makes chickens lethargic, lose appetite, not want to be touched or handled, etc. If your girl is not accepting other eggs to set she may just be going through a molt process.

 

[MamaKitty913]

Hi just a great breed but ours are with others too We keep boys with boys mostly just separate until a few weeks before gathering fertile eggs for incubation. We do have 1 or 2 roosters who stay with the girls seems to keep the more assertive hens something better to do For some reason can't load pictures on byc lately. ..

 

[Winter1]

I got this breed because of their reputation for being extremely docile and friendly, and while none of my silkies have demonstrated that quality so far, I'm hopeful for future generations.

I've actually got the hair-brained idea to try to produce white-crested-black silkies by crossing them with one of my Polish.  I don't know if it will work, but I'm going to give it a shot.

My mom, sister, and I bred some polish silkies and they where so cute and soft. They where like silkies but had normal chicken feathers. We called them " pickles"

 

[Winter1]

I had a flock of 10 silkies once and boy was it fun! If I called out "CHICK CHICK!!!" They would all come running at me and want some bread. The most wonderful silkie I've had was a hen that I called mr.flufferman (I was a little kid then) but when you went up to the flock she would walk up to you a want to be held. Then within second of being in you lap she would fall asleep . But one day a fox wiped out our intire flock except for our rooster. Now I am working on a new flock and I have 5 chickens 3 of wich are silkies. I love them so much!!!!

 

[PrairieChickens]

Quote: I have a "pickle" of my own! lol She's a gold laced polish/silkie mix, but if she's soft, she won't let me near enough to find out! lol

 

[snhchick]

I have a Silkie roo and two hens. These are my first chickens. There seems to be a lot of discussion about how Silkies are not hardy in cold climates, but I'm amazed at how well mine got through the winter.They convinced me to let them free range once the ground was covered with snow because they were bored in their pen. I live in New Hampshire and, even though we had limited REALLY cold weather this winter, it did get down below zero for a couple weeks. The Silkies were fine in their uninsulated, unheated coop and wanted to wander the yard despite the cold. Now we've been having rainy days followed by nighttime temps around freezing. The first night I closed them in soaking wet, I wondered whether they would have trouble keeping warm, but they were fine in the morning. This has happened a couple times and they are fluffy and happy when I let them out.

 

[Sylvester017]

I have a Silkie roo and two hens. These are my first chickens. There seems to be a lot of discussion about how Silkies are not hardy in cold climates, but I'm amazed at how well mine got through the winter.They convinced me to let them free range once the ground was covered with snow because they were bored in their pen. I live in New Hampshire and, even though we had limited REALLY cold weather this winter, it did get down below zero for a couple weeks. The Silkies were fine in their uninsulated, unheated coop and wanted to wander the yard despite the cold. Now we've been having rainy days followed by nighttime temps around freezing. The first night I closed them in soaking wet, I wondered whether they would have trouble keeping warm, but they were fine in the morning. This has happened a couple times and they are fluffy and happy when I let them out.

We had one very heavy rain day and both our Silkie hens got soaked to the skin - wet+cold wind - not good for Silkie "fur." So I paper towel dried them both and let them dry off walking around the kitchen floor before letting them outside again. If they get a little fur wet it's ok but wet to the skin is taking a big chance. I have one Silkie with CRD issues so I don't let her condition get a hold and monitor how wet our girls get. I especially don't let them go to roost while very wet. My two LF get wet to the skin but have the good sense to go into the coop to groom and dry off out of the cold rain, but our Silkies didn't seem to inherit that good sense.