INDIANA BYC'ers HERE!

[ChickCrazed]

Good morning everyone! Had a busy weekend inspecting our honeybee hives and picking strawberries- on top of celebrating Father's Day and my parent's 40th anniversary. The chickens have been enjoying their new patio area-just added a gate outside the run to give them extra room. Our smallest silkie hen was looking quite demure perched on the outside of the run.



This morning when I got up, DH ran into the bedroom saying, "look outside at the silkies!" The silkies were lined up by the door waiting to be let out onto the patio area. (the gate was pulled in closer last night so I could move some chairs around and is much larger when in use) Guess they really like it out there!

My two silkies are about 14 weeks old. The little white silkie is quite the adventurer. She roosts with the big kids and goes in and out to the run all day long. The blue silkie is much more timid, won't roost (I even build a ladder up to the 2 ft high roost to see if that would help, nope) and has yet to step foot outside into the run. I'm hoping it gets braver at some point! Life must be boring sitting in the coop by oneself!

 

[atrueb00]

My two silkies are about 14 weeks old. The little white silkie is quite the adventurer. She roosts with the big kids and goes in and out to the run all day long. The blue silkie is much more timid, won't roost (I even build a ladder up to the 2 ft high roost to see if that would help, nope) and has yet to step foot outside into the run. I'm hoping it gets braver at some point! Life must be boring sitting in the coop by oneself!

I only have one that likes to roost too, the others sleep in a pile. Would love to see pics of your 14 w/o!

 

[ChickCrazed]

I only have one that likes to roost too, the others sleep in a pile. Would love to see pics of your 14 w/o!

I'll try to get some pics tonight. The blue one is the crooked beak chick from Brad. It is too bad that the beak is crooked, it has one heck of a head poof on it! I had to trim it because it couldn't see a thing!!! The white one sure is pretty, smaller crest for sure and no beard, but very pretty and expressive! She looks super pretty bouncing around the run with all the blue Isbars.

 

[atrueb00]

I'll try to get some pics tonight. The blue one is the crooked beak chick from Brad. It is too bad that the beak is crooked, it has one heck of a head poof on it! I had to trim it because it couldn't see a thing!!! The white one sure is pretty, smaller crest for sure and no beard, but very pretty and expressive! She looks super pretty bouncing around the run with all the blue Isbars.

I forgot you had taken the blue cross beak! I am happy to hear he/she is doing well! Amazing what TLC can do. Do you have to trim her beak or feed her anything special now?

 

[kabhyper1]

Does anyone know if you can trim the bottom beak? My broody was tidbitting her chicks and i heard clicking. He bottom beak clicks out of place under the top part. She has notches in the side of her top beak from forcing it into place.I trimmed her top beak a bit, but because it is pretty curved I dont think it did much. It seems her bottomit too long to go back under correctly when she chews. She isnt cross beaked.

 

[ChickCrazed]

I forgot you had taken the blue cross beak! I am happy to hear he/she is doing well! Amazing what TLC can do. Do you have to trim her beak or feed her anything special now?

Nope! It isn't a crossbeak, the two line up perfectly, they are just both a bit crooked on its face. It seems to eat just fine, I would assume it is used to aiming a bit off center for food lol. It is drinking out of my nipple waterers and everything! I just feel bad that it sleeps by itself on the floor. The whole reason I took the white one too was so it would have a buddy to pile with.

I am interested to hear what happens with your long beak Kab, since the crooked beak silkie does have a REALLY long, curved upper beak and I have considered trimming it. Not sure if I should. I'll try to get some pictures tonight.

 

[bradselig]

Does anyone know if you can trim the bottom beak? My broody was tidbitting her chicks and i heard clicking. He bottom beak clicks out of place under the top part. She has notches in the side of her top beak from forcing it into place.I trimmed her top beak a bit, but because it is pretty curved I dont think it did much. It seems her bottomit too long to go back under correctly when she chews. She isnt cross beaked.

I have dremeled the bottom beak. There is a quick so just dont go too far back.

 

[SallyinIndiana]

Here is a nice funny story for you all.
I have roosters and can easily tell them from my hens when they are mature, most times when they are 2 months old or even less on the tall comb breeds. But the same is no where near true for my ducks apparently.
I thought I noticed a fertile egg here and there from the duck pen for the last two weeks. But I thought it was me and I was just seeing things. But today I mad scrambled eggs from the last 4 days of duck eggs. They were all clearly fertil. I still haven't a clue which of our ducks is a male. I have not seen a single duck getting mated for months. And roosters while they will mate a duck don't produce fertile duck eggs.

 

[kabhyper1]

Thanks brad. I trimmed her top one and the sides so her bottom slides into place better. It seemed to help. She has an eagle beak.

 

[PeacefulWalls]

Here is a nice funny story for you all.
I have roosters and can easily tell them from my hens when they are mature, most times when they are 2 months old or even less on the tall comb breeds. But the same is no where near true for my ducks apparently.
I thought I noticed a fertile egg here and there from the duck pen for the last two weeks. But I thought it was me and I was just seeing things. But today I mad scrambled eggs from the last 4 days of duck eggs. They were all clearly fertil. I still haven't a clue which of our ducks is a male. I have not seen a single duck getting mated for months. And roosters while they will mate a duck don't produce fertile duck eggs.

No curled tail feather? It seems like sometimes our males have a bad hair day & their curl lies flatter. I'm also not great with telling their voices apart -- I think partly because we have so many together -- hard to tell who's who! Our best counting was 10 females & 6 males (a few too many...). It's pretty much confirmed as we've had many days with 10 eggs, but never any more than that.