Silkie chickens and egg laying

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Silkievirginia

Chirping
Oct 30, 2023
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I am new to chickens, our school hatched chickens as a university project and then a few of us kept them. I have what I think are three silkie hens, I have one rooster who looks to be an Easter egger and one hen I believe is an Easter egger. They are almost six months old now. We found the first egg about six weeks ago and one more about ten days after that. We assumed it was the Easter egger, hearing that silkies do not usually lay that early but now I don’t know. We went to checking every other day because we were told with the day length shorter they probably would not start laying until spring. One of the silkies began what my daughter and I thought was an egg song - we didn’t check that day but did the next and found nine eggs. I am assuming they all started laying around the same time? Will they all use the same nesting box? They like to be together. I guess we could have overlooked the eggs when we looked on Friday but not a lot of hiding places. That evening I know it was one of my silkies who was up sitting on the nest and laid another pinkish egg. They ate all well formed eggs, shells and a decent size. We are a bit shocked. The other question is - after three days and having a rooster is there any chance of eggs growing chicks. We don’t want that, we took them out of the nest. Will they be safe to eat? Do hens do that, lay eggs in sync? Out of nowhere begin full on egg production?
 
DobieLover said:
Hello and welcome to BYC! :frow Glad you joined.

Three hens can easily share a single nest box.

Not unless they were incubated.


Yes but you should start collecting eggs daily instead of waiting so long.
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The coop has four nesting boxes but I am guessing they like to share. We will absolutely go back to looking every day now - it was a month with nothing. I guess silkies start laying faster than I was told. I guess that means their diet is okay. Is there anything I should know about them- they are so sweet. I was initially bonded with the rooster but he grew up and got more aggressive. He doesn’t peck at the girls. Should I assume all three silkies are laying and the Easter egger with that many eggs? I was told you can even 100% sex a silkie until they are closer to a year or they lay eggs. I can’t truly identify which ones are laying
 
I don’t know - they could be a mix. I just know they have the hairy feet, extra toe and fluffy head. They aren’t too big and they all look completely different. Daisy kind of looks like an owl, butterscotch is the smallest and not really fluffy and then sparrow is mostly black and almost can’t see from his crazy fuzzy head.
 
Silkievirginia said:
The coop has four nesting boxes but I am guessing they like to share. We will absolutely go back to looking every day now - it was a month with nothing. I guess silkies start laying faster than I was told. I guess that means their diet is okay. Is there anything I should know about them- they are so sweet. I was initially bonded with the rooster but he grew up and got more aggressive. He doesn’t peck at the girls. Should I assume all three silkies are laying and the Easter egger with that many eggs? I was told you can even 100% sex a silkie until they are closer to a year or they lay eggs. I can’t truly identify which ones are laying
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Who knows why hens pick the nest they do. Silkies can tend to suffer from vitamin deficiencies so whatever you're feeding them, it must be good stuff! Ours is Kalmbach layer crumbles which is good for them but I still sprinkle some Rooster Booster granules in their feed just to be sure. Sometimes I give them Nutra Drench in their water for a day now and then too. I just try keep problems from happening. Good luck with yours! Sounds like you're doing a great job! :love
 

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