Silkie comb effect on showing

Wolfefarmyard

Crowing
Aug 18, 2017
1,725
3,211
342
Gansevoort, NY
Hello,
I have one silkie cockerel that has an odd comb, it’s not walnut like all of my other silkies. I won’t breed him because of this. However he’s such a gorgeous red color so I’ve decided to keep him.

In theory if I were to show him, how would his comb effect his score? Is it a defect or a disqualification ect?

Thank you so much!

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I apologize for the poor quality pictures please let me knelt if you need better ones!
 
Unfortunately he won't be competitive at any APA/ABA shows :( His color isn't one accepted by the APA. Since silkies are bantams and also in the ABA SOP, I checked that for you too and they also don't accept red as a color. Buff is the closest color either of them accept, but I don't think he looks right for that. I don't personally do silkies though, so I might be wrong.

Anyway, about the comb question - I grabbed my ABA SOP for you to check. Single comb, which is what he appears to have, is indeed a DQ. He'd be disqualified from any shows. So is the absence of the fifth toe, which I can't tell for sure he's missing, but I don't see one on the one foot that is visible. And bare middle toes is also a defect, and it seems he has that, too :(

That's not to say you couldn't enter him in the fair or something, as long as it's not one that's APA or ABA sanctioned. I have no idea how they judge those, since they don't get APA or ABA judges in to a lot of them and also allow the entry of production birds like red sex links that don't actually have a Standard to judge them to, so he might be fine in one of those?

If you really want to get into showing, I'd suggest you visit a nearby APA/ABA sanctioned show, and see if you can pick up a pair or trio from there. That way, you should be able to get started with nice birds from someone who shows and breeds their birds to the Standard.
 
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Unfortunately he won't be competitive at any APA/ABA shows :( He looks like he's hatchery quality. His color isn't one accepted by the APA. Since silkies are bantams and also in the ABA SOP, I checked that for you too and they also don't accept red as a color. Buff is the closest color either of them accept, but I don't think he looks right for that. I don't personally do silkies though, so I might be wrong.

Anyway, about the comb question - I grabbed my ABA SOP for you to check. Single comb, which is what he appears to have, is indeed a DQ. He'd be disqualified from any shows. So is the absence of the fifth toe, which I can't tell for sure he's missing, but I don't see one on the one foot that is visible. And bare middle toes is also a defect, and it seems he has that, too :(

That's not to say you couldn't enter him in the fair or something, as long as it's not one that's APA or ABA sanctioned. I have no idea how they judge those, since they don't get APA or ABA judges in to a lot of them and also allow the entry of production birds like red sex links that don't actually have a Standard to judge them to, so he might be fine in one of those?

If you really want to get into showing, I'd suggest you visit a nearby APA/ABA sanctioned show, and see if you can pick up a pair or trio from there. That way, you should be able to get started with nice birds from someone who shows and breeds their birds to the Standard.

Thank you! He actually came from great stock! His parents came from Kristal, fish mnt farm. She always bred silkies to the standard and had great quality. So I was rather shocked when he came out with a wrong comb.
 
Thank you! He actually came from great stock! His parents came from Kristal, fish mnt farm. She always bred silkies to the standard and had great quality. So I was rather shocked when he came out with a wrong comb.

Wow, that's very surprising since she did have excellent stock! Well, you never know what could be lurking in there. Single comb is recessive, so it was probably hiding for awhile. Then two birds breed that carry it and there you go.
 
Do you knock who his parents were? I wouldn’t put them together again as like Pyxis both are probably have recessive for straight comb. My flock started with Krystal’s silkies too, well some she breed but a few where ones she hatched from other breeders.
The toughest part of breeding is all the culls, it was explained to me by the rules of 10 -hatching out 100 chicks will only get 10 decent and if your lucky 1 exceptional even when both parents are exceptional examples of breed. That will leave you with 90 that aren’t worthy of moving your flock forward. With good record keeping and hard culling you can cull out a lot of recessive traits. But nobody gets 100 percent perfect birds even those that have been breeding the strain for decades.
 
Do you knock who his parents were? I wouldn’t put them together again as like Pyxis both are probably have recessive for straight comb. My flock started with Krystal’s silkies too, well some she breed but a few where ones she hatched from other breeders.
The toughest part of breeding is all the culls, it was explained to me by the rules of 10 -hatching out 100 chicks will only get 10 decent and if your lucky 1 exceptional even when both parents are exceptional examples of breed. That will leave you with 90 that aren’t worthy of moving your flock forward. With good record keeping and hard culling you can cull out a lot of recessive traits. But nobody gets 100 percent perfect birds even those that have been breeding the strain for decades.

Thank you this has been very helpful! Unfortunately I’m not 100% sure whom his parents were, but I do have an idea. If I’m correct, we rehomed his father so that should no longer be an issue.
 

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