October Hatch-a-long 2022🎃🐣🍁

[LadiesAndJane]

@LadiesAndJane there's lemon cuckoo Silkies!!! I didn't know that but now there seems to be every type of colored Silkie. Another update on my hatches, the 6 eggs under my two broody Silkie hens are going strong and I candled the eggs in the incubator (they're on day 9) and of 28 eggs only 5 were duds. Very excited!

Great news on your eggs!
Lemon cuckoo is a project color in Silkies and not officially recognized. We’ll see how it looks, there’s only one. Hopefully it hatches!

 

[Pampered chicken girl]

Beautiful chick. Please update as it feathers in!

I will, I'm very excited to see the colors on her/him! It's mom was columbian buff with this dad

 

[I Like Turkeys]

I think my broody hen’s eggs may be done hatching. One is left in the nest, and hasn’t pipped yet, but 6 hatched. Most of them look vaguely similar in color to her, despite only 3 being her biological chicks, then there is just the random blonde-looking first chick. She seems like a happy mama either way, and has already been getting off the nest to eat and drink with her chicks.

 

[Gammas Bearded Babies]

All yalls babies are lookin so good!
We got the baby fever bad here!!!
We grabbed an egg from the incubator and my 4 year old and 18 month old grandsons crawled down into the closer. 4 yr old knew exactly what we were doin...18 month old was quite confused but excited we were doin something carazy!
I shined the light in the little lavender/black cochin egg and it gave us a full dance...all we were missing is the song! Praying that it is LAVENDER and hatches on 20th!!!
I'll be candling the BUFF Silkies tomorrow for day 5. I have 1 egg I'm havin to manually turn cuz the incubator is maxed...so I'm sure one will not be developing and can be pulled...there is quite an odd shaped egg I've been watching so I'm guessing it will get pulled.

 

[Solanacae]

Test hatch 2 for Lili/Niko:
Lili: 5 set, 1 EQ, 1 with 4 toes each foot, 1 with 5/4 toes. Other 2 look great. All full bearded.
Niko: 3 set, all with good feet, though 1 is non bearded, 1 is half bearded and 1 is full bearded.

I will not be using Lili for breeding and possibly also Niko unless I have a different rooster to cross them. Will have to wait some time to see if that makes a difference.
In this set there were also 3 of Layla’s eggs, all 3 chicks look great. I think also there was one “oops” egg from my bantam Cochin. Chick is paint, bearded, has 5/5 toes. Will have to wait until it is 5 days old when the wing feathers start to come in to be certain.

When you say half bearded, I imagine a chicken with a dark beard on half its face, though I’m sure the mental image doesn’t quite match reality. I’m guessing it’s just not as full of a beard? Could I see a picture of full vs half comparisons? I have several bearded breeds, and my Silkie cross chicks are either Ameraucana or Legbar for the mother. I’m pretty confident the chipmunk patterned one is Ameraucana x Silkie because it has such lovely cheek poofs. The black one, I’m not sure.

 

[Gammas Bearded Babies]

When you say half bearded, I imagine a chicken with a dark beard on half its face, though I’m sure the mental image doesn’t quite match reality. I’m guessing it’s just not as full of a beard? Could I see a picture of full vs half comparisons? I have several bearded breeds, and my Silkie cross chicks are either Ameraucana or Legbar for the mother. I’m pretty confident the chipmunk patterned one is Ameraucana x Silkie because it has such lovely cheek poofs. The black one, I’m not sure.

Oh would love to see pic of your ameraucana/silkie!

 

[LadiesAndJane]

When you say half bearded, I imagine a chicken with a dark beard on half its face, though I’m sure the mental image doesn’t quite match reality. I’m guessing it’s just not as full of a beard? Could I see a picture of full vs half comparisons? I have several bearded breeds, and my Silkie cross chicks are either Ameraucana or Legbar for the mother. I’m pretty confident the chipmunk patterned one is Ameraucana x Silkie because it has such lovely cheek poofs. The black one, I’m not sure.

The bearding gene is incomplete dominant, so that one copy gives some beard and two copies give more beard. No copies gives no beard. You are correct, it generally means the beard will look fuller. This though can be difficult to tell looking at the individual bearded bird if they have one or two copies of the gene. Because I occasionally hatch chicks that are beardless, this means that I must have some birds that only have one copy of the gene.
Though two of the chicks I thought were Niko’s are actually my bantam Cochin’s. Her eggs were inadvertently placed to hatch. The eggs are much the same size and appearance as some of my Silkie pullets. Her chicks do appear very similar to paint Silkies at hatch until they develop red feathers as they feather in. It’s quite a remarkable difference.
These chicks are starting to develop smooth feathers on their wing tips which is usually evident by 5 to 6 days of age. One of the chicks is beardless and the other one is half bearded. It can also be difficult to tell how much beard a chick will develop as the beard does not come in fully until they are an adult.

Half bearded

Beardless

The Cochin mother is beardless so this means my rooster must only carry one copy of the bearding gene, even though he appears full bearded.

This blue chick is full bearded:

Chick, juvenile and adult photos of half bearded Niko. She appeared full bearded as a chick.

Full bearded Kana and Laya:

This Olive Egger juvenile is half Easter Egger and half Barnevelder. She is half bearded.

2 weeks of age:

At 8 weeks of age her beard seems to have disappeared and only has the muffs left.
The beard may fill in as she gets older.

Hope this makes sense.

 

[3KillerBs]

Obviously the yolk has run out. The chicks have really started taking a strong interest in their feed today.

They ate ALL their wet mash and scattered dry feed all over creation.

 

[Solanacae]

The bearding gene is incomplete dominant, so that one copy gives some beard and two copies give more beard. No copies gives no beard. You are correct, it generally means the beard will look fuller. This though can be difficult to tell looking at the individual bearded bird if they have one or two copies of the gene. Because I occasionally hatch chicks that are beardless, this means that I must have some birds that only have one copy of the gene.
Though two of the chicks I thought were Niko’s are actually my bantam Cochin’s. Her eggs were inadvertently placed to hatch. The eggs are much the same size and appearance as some of my Silkie pullets. Her chicks do appear very similar to paint Silkies at hatch until they develop red feathers as they feather in. It’s quite a remarkable difference.
These chicks are starting to develop smooth feathers on their wing tips which is usually evident by 5 to 6 days of age. One of the chicks is beardless and the other one is half bearded. It can also be difficult to tell how much beard a chick will develop as the beard does not come in fully until they are an adult.

Half bearded
View attachment 3288570

Beardless
View attachment 3288571

The Cochin mother is beardless so this means my rooster must only carry one copy of the bearding gene, even though he appears full bearded.

This blue chick is full bearded:View attachment 3288578

Chick, juvenile and adult photos of half bearded Niko. She appeared full bearded as a chick.

View attachment 3288564View attachment 3288565

View attachment 3288562View attachment 3288561

Full bearded Kana and Laya:View attachment 3288560
View attachment 3288577

This Olive Egger juvenile is half Easter Egger and half Barnevelder. She is half bearded.

2 weeks of age:
View attachment 3288569

At 8 weeks of age her beard seems to have disappeared and only has the muffs left.
The beard may fill in as she gets older.
View attachment 3288579
Hope this makes sense.

Yes, that makes perfect sense! Thank you for including so many pictures.

Oh would love to see pic of your ameraucana/silkie!

I don’t have any from the past day or two, but here are some from hatch day and about day 3 or 4 post hatch. The last picture is the black chick that’s half Silkie but I’m unsure if the mother was Legbar or Ameraucana. It doesn’t have poofy cheeks, but it doesn’t have anything indicating a crest (yet) so I’m unsure still which is the more likely parentage.

Both have gotten tail feathers growing in (they hatched a week ago today) so I’m curious if that’s an indication of both being pullets. @3KillerBs, I know there is probably plenty of variation in different strains of Australorps, but how quickly do yours get tail feathers and is that a reliable indicator of gender?

 

[AusHen]

5 out of 6 have hatched so far. I have attached what they apparently are. Last egg is a nice olive so I hope that hatches. They will be going under my broody hen tonight, shes a very reliable mum