I have found them to be of rather frail constitutions. I am hoping to correct that by crossing to regular lavenders and blacks. The cross to lavenders last year went very well, they eggs I'm hatching now are better shaped and colored, plus a lot more of them. Only a percentage are silkied, but enough to get a breeding pen of the improved ones going, and to cross 1 cockerel into the blacks for this year's improvement.
True that!!
The rooster may be aging, or have a couple of favored hens who satisfy his urge so others aren't covered, or he or the girls may be heavily feathered on the back end which can interfere in successful mating.
Silkie are tough to tell until they crow or lay an egg, though a cockerel does tend to have more pronounced wattles and a wider comb at a younger age...it just isn't as cut and dried as most other breeds. We have a current broody who I was 80% convinced was a rooster till I caught her in an egg box finally.
Or I’m so old that I can’t see. 
I last night close to dusk, two of my turkeys were missing. A red and my favorite mottled black. I assume they had just gone off to lay some eggs, since the one has done that before. The bourbon red was back this morning, but the mottled Black was not. I’m hoping she just went broody and is hunkered down somewhere. 
Sounds like a good plan. Working independently for a few generations will make our flocks good candidates for swapping eggs or chicks in the future to enhance the genetic diversity. I have noticed differences in the black and lavender lines I bought from John Blehm 2 years ago. Neither lay without additional lighting, but the lavenders start laying sooner when the lights are added. The blacks take longer to ramp up, but easily out lay the lavenders over time. The eggs from the blacks are larger and bluer also. That is my reason for wanting to cross my newest silkied chicks over some of the pure blacks, to improve the eggs even more.Ok, I just wanted to make sure that it wasn't just me, thank you. I'm using a silkie feathered roo over split hens this time and will probably raise out a black roo that is split to lavender and silkie feathers to cover the girls next time around. Egg size and shape is much better from the split girls this year but they're still green tinted. I'll be putting any silkied hens that I grow out this year under a really awesome roo from last year's hatches to make some new splits and work on the egg color/shape more
