My first perfect hatch; 7/7 Silkies!

[LadiesAndJane]

Thank you!

I had a little recessive white girl I hatched that was really hard to tell from a buff too. I suspect she was probably gold based, maybe your little white girl is as well. She still might be silver based and the one copy of silver just doesn't shine through though.

The ground color is sex linked but I don't really know that it'll be obvious which one has which ground color at hatch. Maybe I shouldn't have called it sex linked but rather just said the father determines the ground color in girls. I just really like the bright white of the silver gene so thought it would be nice to know your females would all have that with your silver gene boy as the father. I am really interested to see if the females hatched do actually express the smokey color in yours like they do in mine though!

If your white girl is gold based the male offspring would carry both silver and gold (I've seen it called golden before). I'm not sure how the down would look in these. I think the silver tends to be more dominant than the gold in golden males but it's still a bit different looking than a silver/silver male in colors where ground color is more obvious (like partridge).

As far as what you might get with your silver gene white boy over the partridge girl it is a bit hard to say. Recessive white is really good at hiding other colors. That being said I've heard a lot of recessive whites are partridge under the white. If your silver gene boy is like a lot of recessive whites and carries partridge than you could get partridge offspring from the pair. They will all carry a recessive white gene from dad and if bred back to a recessive white would produce 50% recessive white offspring.

If your boy is partridge under the white you should get silver partridge females and golden partridge males from the pairing. It sounds like your partridge girl may also be blue rather than black so you might also get 50% that have the lighter blue underfluff if that is the case.

If you try out the white/partridge pairing what offspring you do get hopefully will help to figure out what color dad is underneath the white.

I'm definitely not one to judge when it comes to mixing colors. I know some breeders really discourage it but I don't have anything against it as long as someone is upfront about their chicks coming from a mixed color pen when selling. I myself am trying to breed my paints to standard but I also really like the calico look of some color combos and I'll be doing that as a fun project as well hopefully next year. It sounds like the arguments against mixing colors really don't apply much to where you live anyway so that is a bonus!

I can't wait to see what kind of offspring you do get from your silkies!

Thank you so much for your helpful reply!

 

[- Serama Mama -]

Oh my goodness, LynnaePB! Thank you so much for all of your information! AND your pictures! They are MOST helpful in trying to compare to what I've got. I've seen some of your posts in the "Silkies of Other Colors" thread! I tried to read as much through there to guess at colors before I started guessing what mine were.

So to answer your questions...

The lighter chocolate girl DOES have a stripe down her back. I doubt you can see her but she's right next to the black one on top. It's slightly darker than her somewhat dun coloring (*I had a Serama hatch out that same color and she's feathered into a lemon blue):

That is also my very first Serama chick, bred here on my little backyard "farm", in the photo (*she looks just like her mom, who was born with that same color stripe and dot on the head and wound up becoming a silkied cuckoo so...big hopes! She wasn't fully dried yet but she was the only one left in the (VERY humid) incubator and was SCREAMING her head off being all alone so I popped her in a little early. I've got them in a brooder cage with a cardboard box in it and a heat bulb right next to my bed so I can always keep an eye on them. My husband thinks I'm crazy )

Just for reference, this is what her suspected mom looked like when she was a chick; same color stripe and dot on the head! It was just a day or so after this we discovered that she was a Silkied Serama!

The other little brown one, definitely does have the little stripes around the eyes and from above it does seem like there is a darker stripe down her back. I imagine she'll look somewhat like your own up there who had similar markings, without the stripes. And you can kinda see the stripe on tbe lighter brown one here, too.

That's the darker brown one top left and the lighter one's head at the bottom (please excuse the errant flap of cardboard )

The little gold partridges are the first I've hatched out with stripes. The silver partridge I have above came out looking very similar to the color he is now but no stripes and is also starting to display some red leakage so I guess he's likely a torti as well! As for the other girl, Hershey, she seems like she's going to color out into something similar (or just like) those Red Pyle ones.

Regarding your assessments of the blacks, I think we have ONE that will be full black; he is noticably darker than the other two and has no little feather tips that are silver or gold or blonde like my girl Hershey up there did. We've been calling the little black one, Vanta Black, since he's just SO dark!

That's Vanta on the bottom there, sucking up all the light around him And again, the darker brown one above him.

The other two, I also suspect one may be blue or gray. When Nickels (below) first hatched out his feathers were a noticeable silver/blue color and then he fluffed up and now all we can see are the littlest lighter colored tips. And the other one has a small gray patch under his chin/beak. I can't find a more up close pics of him so I'll be sure to get some of them all from different angles later today. But maybe they both will be gray or blue? I know they're two different colors, I am just so new to this that I'm not quite sure WHAT those differences are...but I'm very willing and able to learn!

This is the Nickels. You can kind of see the light silvery tips to his feathers. Which is almost exactly what Hershey looked like at first only she had slightly blonde tips that turned into that deep red/brown she has.

But yes, you're very correct that this particular eBay seller has gotten me some chicks that didn't present with stripes and still came out partridge-looking. I believe he keeps a mixed color flock, otherwise, I probably wouldn't be having so much fun guessing what everyone will look like! He did say in the listing we could hatch out anything from partridge, black, white, buff, blue, or gray. I guess that's why I was so surprised to see that Hershey had the coloring she did! Honestly, I kinda like having the weirdo colors; I likely won't be trying to show anyone and personally, I like having the unique and interesting mixes. From your incredible mix of colors and patterns, it would seem that you do, too!

Your Silkies are all absolutely beautiful And it's very, very clear to me that I must begin reading up on Silkie genetics before any of these guys get to breeding age. I have one black bearded silkie hen (named Henrietta) who I'd gotten to be the broody mom for my Seramas but then the older she got, the more beautiful she became and I was convinced I needed to provide her some friends. My little Serama cockerel, Rusty, has tried and tried and tried to mount her only for her to chase him around for a good five minutes until he relents for another few days She's about 5 months ahead of these guys (so just laid her first egg) but I definitely notice she's warming up to my silver tortoiseshell partridge up there.

I also agree fully with what you wrote about the silver based white silkie jnms posted above; he's absolutely beautiful! I believe my little white guy was buff based as we could not determine at first whether he was white or buff. But man, I'd love to get some little silver based white like that!

Thank you again to you both! You've been incredibly helpful and kind and I truly appreciate the feedback! I went into this whole chicken thing intent on breeding Seramas and now I find myself with a split flock of Silkies and Seramas, heh. At least they get along well!

I have to take some more individual pics of the babies today for my breeding partner/BCF (*best chicken friend ) so I'm gonna try to get some pics in natural light today and I will post them here once I've got them. Maybe we can get some better looks at everyone. She's trying to make some guesses at their genetics and just ordered this gigantic book on chicken genetics so we'll see what happens. I need to share the "Silkies of Other Colors" thread with her so she can see what some of you resident experts have already had to say

Truly, I'd be lost without this website!

 

[LynnaePB]

Oh my goodness, LynnaePB! Thank you so much for all of your information! AND your pictures! They are MOST helpful in trying to compare to what I've got. I've seen some of your posts in the "Silkies of Other Colors" thread! I tried to read as much through there to guess at colors before I started guessing what mine were.

So to answer your questions...

The lighter chocolate girl DOES have a stripe down her back. I doubt you can see her but she's right next to the black one on top. It's slightly darker than her somewhat dun coloring (*I had a Serama hatch out that same color and she's feathered into a lemon blue):
View attachment 2360836
That is also my very first Serama chick, bred here on my little backyard "farm", in the photo (*she looks just like her mom, who was born with that same color stripe and dot on the head and wound up becoming a silkied cuckoo so...big hopes! She wasn't fully dried yet but she was the only one left in the (VERY humid) incubator and was SCREAMING her head off being all alone so I popped her in a little early. I've got them in a brooder cage with a cardboard box in it and a heat bulb right next to my bed so I can always keep an eye on them. My husband thinks I'm crazy )

View attachment 2360860
Just for reference, this is what her suspected mom looked like when she was a chick; same color stripe and dot on the head! It was just a day or so after this we discovered that she was a Silkied Serama!

The other little brown one, definitely does have the little stripes around the eyes and from above it does seem like there is a darker stripe down her back. I imagine she'll look somewhat like your own up there who had similar markings, without the stripes. And you can kinda see the stripe on tbe lighter brown one here, too.

View attachment 2360843
That's the darker brown one top left and the lighter one's head at the bottom (please excuse the errant flap of cardboard )

The little gold partridges are the first I've hatched out with stripes. The silver partridge I have above came out looking very similar to the color he is now but no stripes and is also starting to display some red leakage so I guess he's likely a torti as well! As for the other girl, Hershey, she seems like she's going to color out into something similar (or just like) those Red Pyle ones.

Regarding your assessments of the blacks, I think we have ONE that will be full black; he is noticably darker than the other two and has no little feather tips that are silver or gold or blonde like my girl Hershey up there did. We've been calling the little black one, Vanta Black, since he's just SO dark!

View attachment 2360844
That's Vanta on the bottom there, sucking up all the light around him And again, the darker brown one above him.

The other two, I also suspect one may be blue or gray. When Nickels (below) first hatched out his feathers were a noticeable silver/blue color and then he fluffed up and now all we can see are the littlest lighter colored tips. And the other one has a small gray patch under his chin/beak. I can't find a more up close pics of him so I'll be sure to get some of them all from different angles later today. But maybe they both will be gray or blue? I know they're two different colors, I am just so new to this that I'm not quite sure WHAT those differences are...but I'm very willing and able to learn!

View attachment 2360845
This is the Nickels. You can kind of see the light silvery tips to his feathers. Which is almost exactly what Hershey looked like at first only she had slightly blonde tips that turned into that deep red/brown she has.

But yes, you're very correct that this particular eBay seller has gotten me some chicks that didn't present with stripes and still came out partridge-looking. I believe he keeps a mixed color flock, otherwise, I probably wouldn't be having so much fun guessing what everyone will look like! He did say in the listing we could hatch out anything from partridge, black, white, buff, blue, or gray. I guess that's why I was so surprised to see that Hershey had the coloring she did! Honestly, I kinda like having the weirdo colors; I likely won't be trying to show anyone and personally, I like having the unique and interesting mixes. From your incredible mix of colors and patterns, it would seem that you do, too!

Your Silkies are all absolutely beautiful And it's very, very clear to me that I must begin reading up on Silkie genetics before any of these guys get to breeding age. I have one black bearded silkie hen (named Henrietta) who I'd gotten to be the broody mom for my Seramas but then the older she got, the more beautiful she became and I was convinced I needed to provide her some friends. My little Serama cockerel, Rusty, has tried and tried and tried to mount her only for her to chase him around for a good five minutes until he relents for another few days She's about 5 months ahead of these guys (so just laid her first egg) but I definitely notice she's warming up to my silver tortoiseshell partridge up there.

I also agree fully with what you wrote about the silver based white silkie jnms posted above; he's absolutely beautiful! I believe my little white guy was buff based as we could not determine at first whether he was white or buff. But man, I'd love to get some little silver based white like that!

Thank you again to you both! You've been incredibly helpful and kind and I truly appreciate the feedback! I went into this whole chicken thing intent on breeding Seramas and now I find myself with a split flock of Silkies and Seramas, heh. At least they get along well!

I have to take some more individual pics of the babies today for my breeding partner/BCF (*best chicken friend ) so I'm gonna try to get some pics in natural light today and I will post them here once I've got them. Maybe we can get some better looks at everyone. She's trying to make some guesses at their genetics and just ordered this gigantic book on chicken genetics so we'll see what happens. I need to share the "Silkies of Other Colors" thread with her so she can see what some of you resident experts have already had to say

Truly, I'd be lost without this website!

I can't wait to see more pictures of your little cuties!

Congratulations on hatching your first little serama from your own flock, how exciting! It is adorable, it really does look a lot like the suspected mom did as a chick!

I probably shouldn't be calling anything with stripes a likely partridge. I've gotten into the bad habit of calling anything partridge like "partridge". It seems to me this is very common in the silkie world (probably due to patterning not showing as well on silkie feathers). Partridge breeders would probably be rolling their eyes.

I'm not even sure that all the "partridges" I showed are technically partridges. They are very genetically similar to partridges at the very least.

I can try to address the difference between blue/gray. Gray is essentially just a silver partridge without penciling. Grays and silver partridge are very similar and are almost genetically the same. Gray is a recognized color where silver partridge is not. A silver partridge would likely be called a gray still but the penciling would be a fault.

Blues won't really have silver shining through as adults unless they happen to have leakage (which will show up in the hackles mostly). There should be a gradient of dark to lighter blue in blues as they are supposed to have dark lacing (you just can't really tell since the silkie feathers don't make it obvious). They still look more uniformly blue than a silver partridge/gray would though.

I was just perusing a silkie genetics group last night and it really opened my eyes to just how deceiving down color can sometimes be! Sometimes just a little deceiving. Like a very light colored partridge like chick growing into a very dark partridge like bird. Other times it was very deceiving. Like a very dark chocolate colored chick with absolutely no partridge like chick pattern turning out looking like a silver partridge like bird.

It sure is fun seeing what surprises you get when mixing colors! I love interesting mixes! All the partridges (or partridge like birds) except the blue I shared were actually hatched from another breeders eggs. Other than the red ones none were supposed to be partridge (all but the red partridges came from paint eggs). The breeder had a little oops and suspected someone was jumping the fence. She was great, she offered to replace the eggs but the interesting colors worked out in my favor since I needed more birds with red leakage to contribute to my upcoming calico projects.

I suspect your chicks with at least faint stripes on the back will turn out looking somewhat partridge like but who knows. It'll be really fun watching their color come in I bet!

I'm definitely not an expert, just an enthusiastic novice so take what I say with a grain of salt.

 

[- Serama Mama -]

Well we didn't make it outside today since it was so cold already (damn you, Pittsburgh weather!) but my friend helped me take some pics in the bedroom. This was the light brown chick and the blackest one next to each other. I think she was trying to compare the feet colors. She thinks the brown ones have lighter feet and maybe they do, the lighting might just be bad in the pics Everyone is looking a lot fatter and fluffier today, including my little Serama!

We were just trying to get some better pics of everyone but hardly anyone wanted to sit still and almost all wanted to jump like lemmings off the edge of the bed so I'm just going to post them while I've got the battery to do so and write more later! I really appreciate all you've written and the time you have taken to respond to me. I'm learning so much these last couple days!

 

[RevlisRemmah]

Howdy BYC!

Tonight was hatch day for the last set of shipped eggs for the year. I won an auction I didn't expect to win for some bearded silkies and, after using HatchBright liberally almost every day when I opened the lid, I had a perfect hatch in my incubator, my very first ever!

View attachment 2356732

I am so elated I am just beyond the moon.

The little golden partridge who's most fluffed up seems to have some toes curling under her feet that I may have to bandage but otherwise, everyone is doing fantastic! Only 1 required a full assist on the hatch and that was due to a large pip hole and excessive drying on the membrane. I can't believe I actually managed a perfect hatch on shipped eggs though! These guys had some WILD saddle cells and deformations from shipping by air but I guess it just goes to show you just how resilient these little guys can be, especially when you use a product like HatchBright to help them hatch out heavier, healthier, and with better vein growth throughout incubation.

View attachment 2356734

So... anyone have any ideas what colors we might be looking at? We think we've got some partridges, maybe a black, a few gray or blue, and some of the red/chocolate colored ones with the black undercoat? Apologies if I'm way off base, please excuse my ignorance! I'm just starting to learn about the genetics behind silkie colors and we're trying to work on a project to create a specific look with these guys so we're learning as we go along.

View attachment 2356736

Link to the Silkies photo album with videos

Any advice about what possible colors we might be looking at is greatly appreciated! And if anyone has any idea how I can help treat the little partridge with the two toes curling under the food, PLEASE let me know what I can do! She's just walking on top of them, like it's no big deal. Everyone else's toes look great!

Thanks for letting me share everyone! This is my most successful hatch, ever, and I'm so proud to be able to share it with you all!

- Serama Mama -

They are SO adorable! I’m excited to see pictures as they grow! Can I ask- what is HatchBright?

 

[- Serama Mama -]

They are SO adorable! I’m excited to see pictures as they grow! Can I ask- what is HatchBright?

Absolutely! So when I was searching for eggs on eBay I came across the incubation spray and it's called Hatch Bright. This is the link to the LEGITIMATE seller and creator of the product:

https://ebay.us/6Hfeyx

I was skeptical at first but I had a bunch of money from the PUA program that finally came in and I figured I might as well try it. To say that it has far exceeded my expectations would be an understatement; I don't plan on ever incubating a clutch of eggs without this stuff! Since I began using it, I noticed a much better hatch rate on my shipped eggs (*these silkies had CRAZY deformed air cells and STILL all hatched out), the chicks that hatch seem heavier and healthier, and I most definitely SEE the increased vein growth in my eggs when I candle them.

I've gotta sound like a commercial at this point but it's all true. I wish I'd had this from the very start. I wound up getting this four pack and haven't had to open a second one yet and I've done at least 5 or 6 hatches since I received it. They come in small, unlabeled baggies (it's definitely a small operation) with a printed page with instructions on how to use them. You basically just mix one packet with 8 oz of water in a spray bottle and then keep it chilled in the fridge so that when you spray it, it is more likely to be absorbed into the egg shell. I use it every single day; just a light spritz on the eggs after I've mixed them up and then repeat daily. It has most definitely made my hatches much easier, better, and more successful.

 

[- Serama Mama -]

Just a few more pics to update I weighed my little Serama last night. She was a whopping 9.82 grams! The tiniest chick I've ever hatched. She's made it this far though and she's eating and drinking on her own now so I'm cautiously optimistic about her prognosis!

This is Merlin. We call him that cuz of his gray beard We thought he might be blue or gray cuz that's what color he looked before fluffing up but now he looks brownish!

This is the darker chocolate one. Love that crest!

The lighter brown one! She still has that stripe. And her wing feathers almost look like they might be frizzle shaped? They're curling outward from her body

The little golden one I have left; my partner took the curly toed one and thanks to the sandals, they're almost fully straight already!

And I tried to get a good angle of him looking at me but no such luck. This one DEFINITELY has some blondish feathers coming out though. Not as red or dark as Hershey's did when hers came in so now I'm wondering what this one is gonna look like and whether I should re-home her with the lady who was waiting on her or keep her here! I'm about to have an explosion of Seramas so she can always get more birds.

I also got my shipment of birds from Ken Howe of select-poultry.com!

Dexter here was beat up BEFORE transit and it looks like someone mangled his poor comb wen he was little. He exchequer pattern is wonderful and his tail is amazingly long; biggest one in the flock here. I'll be working to rehab him and I'll be holding onto the birchen as well, who has a tail and stance that are magnificent. And the cocoas are just stunning! I've got a little bit of every color from many different genetic lines now; watch out, Serama world! Steel City Seramas and the determined ladies who run it are making big things happen

 

[LynnaePB]

Just a few more pics to update I weighed my little Serama last night. She was a whopping 9.82 grams! The tiniest chick I've ever hatched. She's made it this far though and she's eating and drinking on her own now so I'm cautiously optimistic about her prognosis!

View attachment 2366522
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This is Merlin. We call him that cuz of his gray beard We thought he might be blue or gray cuz that's what color he looked before fluffing up but now he looks brownish!
View attachment 2366524View attachment 2366526

This is the darker chocolate one. Love that crest!
View attachment 2366531View attachment 2366532

The lighter brown one! She still has that stripe. And her wing feathers almost look like they might be frizzle shaped? They're curling outward from her body
View attachment 2366533View attachment 2366535

The little golden one I have left; my partner took the curly toed one and thanks to the sandals, they're almost fully straight already!
View attachment 2366537

And I tried to get a good angle of him looking at me but no such luck. This one DEFINITELY has some blondish feathers coming out though. Not as red or dark as Hershey's did when hers came in so now I'm wondering what this one is gonna look like and whether I should re-home her with the lady who was waiting on her or keep her here! I'm about to have an explosion of Seramas so she can always get more birds.
View attachment 2366540

I also got my shipment of birds from Ken Howe of select-poultry.com!
View attachment 2366550View attachment 2366551View attachment 2366552
Dexter here was beat up BEFORE transit and it looks like someone mangled his poor comb wen he was little. He exchequer pattern is wonderful and his tail is amazingly long; biggest one in the flock here. I'll be working to rehab him and I'll be holding onto the birchen as well, who has a tail and stance that are magnificent. And the cocoas are just stunning! I've got a little bit of every color from many different genetic lines now; watch out, Serama world! Steel City Seramas and the determined ladies who run it are making big things happen

Aww look at those cuties!

I don't know much about the size of serama chicks but sounds like the little cutie you hatched is super tiny. I hope she thrives for you!

Mixed color flocks sure keep you guessing about color! I never would have guessed by looking at chick down that the one little black looking chick would feather in with so much gold! I guess you really can't trust chick down when getting colors from a mixed flock.

That would be neat if the one little cutie was frizzled. I've had some chicks whose wing feathers start out similar to that one but they didn't end up frizzled. I guess it'll be pretty obvious either way as the feathers come in more.

Those serama are beautiful! I may not know anything about seramas but it sounds like you are off to a great start with them! They are adorable little birds!