R these pure silkies and how old LOTS OF PICS

[Sonoran Silkies]

The most reliable way (other than seeing one lay an egg

) to tell the gender on guineas is their call. Males say, "buck, buck, buck..." Females say that, plus also, "Buck-wheat, buck-wheat, buckwheat." Appearance is far less obvious an indicator.

 

[lovemychicks2much]

Quote:
so you cant tell by the waddles i thought you could if not then why is there waddles different? im so confused now lol bu then again it dont take much for me to get confused

 

[dancingbear]

From looking at the wattles, it looks like you are correct, one male, one female, just the way you have them marked in the photos. However, sometimes the shape of the wattles is wrong. I have a purple female with wattles that look like a male's. I haven't seen males with female looking wattles, but I'm sure it happens.

The call is the best way to tell. I know, everybody says the female says "buckwheat." That's not what it sounds like to me at all. It sounds like a rusty gate hinge, er-ERK er-ERK er-ERK, like that, two syllables. Both sexes do single syllable calls, and the long drawn out machine-gun pattern calls, and soft little whistles and chirps. But only the females do the clear, two-syllable "er-ERK" sound.

If you go down to where they stay at night, before they settle in for the night, they'll probably be running around calling each other. That's a great time to watch and listen, and see who calls what. You can watch closely, and see the beak open when they call, so you can see when one is calling two syllables, or one. I know it can be really hard to tell when they both are yelling, they can be really loud, and they echo.

If they both sound alike, and there's a two syllable call, you have two females.

ETA: If all else fails, if you have a female, you'll eventually see eggs. If you see two eggs appear in one day, you'll know for sure about both. If you keep getting one egg at a time, or find them in weird places with no idea how long they've been there, you can break one open and check the germ disc to see if it's fertile. If you don't know how to do that, look at the stickies in the "incubating and hatching eggs" section. There's a thread with photos that will show you what to look for. So if you get an egg, and can see the "bulls-eye" that indicates fertility, you'll know you have one of each.