Sexing silkies......?

[Dawn419]

Lurky,

Love your Silkies...we have 5 ourselves and they are DH's fave's.

It's really hard to sex them until they crow or lay an egg.

At 6 or 7 weeks old, I made a post about lucking up and getting 1 roo out of 5. Sigh...at 17 weeks old, we have atleast 2 cockerals (combs, wattles and crowing) with 2 more that look to be roo-possibilities (combs coming in).

Dawn

 

[bantymum]

A banty breeder told me that he throws his hat into the run just over the top of them and if they run in the opposite direction or run for cover : they are girls.
If they stand there and check it out: they are boys.
try it!

 

[siz8003]

ok there is way to many things to try and i bet that each thing will give me a diff. result

man i better have 3 girls

 

[Enchanted Sunrise Farms]

Hi Lurky,

i'll take head shots of my kids tomorrow and show you what they look like now. i have three at 7-weeks-old and nine at 8-weeks-old. Four of them have very distinct wattles, larger bumpy noses, and big feet. Their behavior is very different than the others, very bold and aggressive. My partridge, Lulu the Roo, is very fretful. i can pick up the others just fine, but he freaks when my hand comes near, hunches down and out go the hackles and wings. i'm a little mad about that as i bought her (him) from mypetchicken.com and paid extra to have everyone sexed female.

The rest of the ones i suspect as male are ones i hatched. i'm really hoping to end up with at least six girls.

i hope most of yours are girls, they're all so pretty.

 

[lurky]

Thanks, and i appreciate you posting pics. I think i do have one that is harder to handle. I think they all act more like girls though. I do think i will have to wait til the egg or crow thing. Its just hard to get attached if you cant keep them all. I will just have to be patient. But seeing others to compare at least gives you a feeling about it. Funny how all my birds seem to be behind on developing....I wonder if they develop faster if you put them on grower sooner. Oh well, I look forward to seeing your pictures.

 

[Enchanted Sunrise Farms]

i know, i'm experiencing that emotional dilemma now. i need to downsize in general, and will have to get rid of the boys. i may be fooling myself, but i think i can tell the boys from the girls, based on comparisons. There's only one of the supposed boys that i really like, so may hold onto him as long as i can.

On the size thing, not sure it's a matter of feed. That partridge silkie is two to three times bigger than all the rest, and they all eat the same things. i have two sweet little grey ones that i'm sure are girls. They're the smallest and look more like yours. i just love them. They like to hop up on my lap to be held and petted, then they turn their little heads and look up at me. They look me right in the eye. Melts me every time.

 

[lurky]

On the size thing i mentioned, i meant ALL my birds seem to be behind compared to others i see on here. I started to notice this when they were getting closer to egg laying age and people were comparing pics of the development and color of the comb/waddles. Now they are behind on laying. As for the boy girl comparison, i could tell by personality with my big birds who the boy was....i kinda learned from him....but did see it. Then i got my bantams and i payed to have them sexed , but knew i had 2 boys by 4 weeks old. Mine pretty much look and act like girls. To judge by size would give me 3 boys here as only one is small. I hope i instead have one runt. I hope seeing yours will help. Thanks again.

 

[siz8003]

just thought i would add a pic

 

[Enchanted Sunrise Farms]

Okay, here goes lot's of pics. One problem i need to mention is most of the pictures have a weird brown smear in the middle.

First, here is an updated pic of Lulu the RooRoo:

Then the ones i think are boys:

i think these are girls:

This is one i am not sure about:

i would love to hear from others on what they think. Would the normal course be that one thinks they may have a girl, but then it develops into a boy? Has anyone had a silkie with big wattles and combs at 8 weeks that turned out to be a girl? i would hate to get rid of any girls here.

 

[Enchanted Sunrise Farms]

Lurky,

Sorry i didn't understand your comment regarding the size thing. i wonder if weather has anything to do with growth. You know how in the summer your hair grows more? i wonder if chickens get bigger if raised in a warm climate? Or i suppose it could be a feed issue. i put mine on grower at 6 weeks, as they were sneaking it from my older girls anyhow.