I need help with breed and gender *pics*

[Mystary]

Hello everyone,

Please let me tell you how my chick season went before I ask my questions, so please bear with me. I already had 4 big beautiful Buff Orpington hens. So I decided to expand on my flock. I bought eight chicks from a local auction. Needless to say they all ended up boys, so I sold all but two of them. Here they are a 5 months old:

Then I decided to try my luck with hatching the eggs myself. This was the first time for incubating eggs. I bought a dozen fertile eggs from ebay and only two hatched...bummer, and guess what????? I had two more boys. Here they are at 3 months old:

At the same time I hatched the buff eggs I also decided to try Silkie eggs. I bought them from the local auction. 5 of the 12 hatched. I have 3 left of the Silkies. One died right after hatching and I sold the other one last Friday. I know I have at least 2 boys. Here is a picture with all three, the two in front are boys but I'm not sure about the one in the back. Any ideas?

Here is two of the silkies, the one in the front is a boy but what about the one in the back?

Five weeks ago I went back to the auction and I bought 20!! buff chicks. So far I have weeded out at least 7 boys and I sold them. I have 2 chicks in the batch that are not buffs. I have know idea what they are. Could someone please tell me what breed they are? When they were little they looked just like the Buffs. They are 5 weeks old.

I decided to throw this pic in because it is so cute. The little buff just jumped on my lap and made itself at home:

Thanks in advance for your help,

Tina


Ohh, I forgot to say the silkies are 3 months old also

 

[LilPeeps]

You have some bad luck with cockerels LOL All three silkies are male. The red chicks look like production reds.

 

[SundownWaterfowl]

It does look like you have 3 male silkies. Silkies combs are supposed to be dark purple, like the one all the way on the right, not red like the other two.

 

[Mystary]

Thanks for the responses. I guess the silkies are not pure otherwise they should have black skin. That is a bummer that they are probably all males. So the chicks with my Buffs might be production reds? What are production reds? Thanks again,

Tina

 

[tiki244]

I havent seen the pictures yet, but production reds are a type of Rhode Island Red that is bred to produce lots of eggs, which in the process has changed the feather color lighter than an RIR. I think though as babys they tend to be lighter and as adults they get darker, so you might have some RIRs there. Im not sure. They do tend to be pretty friendly as babys. You got some buff babys though.

 

[LilPeeps]

Production reds are what hatcheries sell as rirs. They have been crossed with other breeds to improve laying. Their color is much lighter than a true rir.

 

[Mystary]

Are these production reds friendly when they get older? Or does it just depend on the chicken? Sorry for all the questions. I have no experience with them.

Tina

 

[LilPeeps]

The one I had was quite friendly.

 

[Nemo]

Looking at the first three pictures, I have to ask... Are you raising your BOs for some sort of synchronized chicken competition? If so, then you'll lose a few hundredths of a point for the closer chicken in the second picture... His tail isn't as upright as his partner.

 

[shay20]

They are nice looking boys, great job.