Silkie thread!

[Maligator Love]

Thank you so much for your warm thoughts. My DH went under the house this morning to remove the carcass but it was only feathers. He found the tracks of Boonie, our next door neighbor's raccoon, where she had dragged the bird over to their house. Boonie was brought to them as a baby so they hand-raised it. It's an indoor/outdoor coon and they feed it very well. That's why I didn't think she would go to the trouble of catching a chicken when she never wants for food. Obviously I was wrong. Lesson learned. I'll take extra measures to keep the flock safe.

What a gorgeous boy! And such a horrible situation. You should make the owners of the raccoon aware of what happened.

I have had predator attacks pretty often. The local fox came during the day and took out six of my girls and my duck. I set the dogs on him and now the trap is waiting for him to wonder into it. We had a ok relationship of him taking a roo every once in a while but taking out six girls for no reason has pushed me over the edge.

 

[Orps]

Thank you so much for your warm thoughts. My DH went under the house this morning to remove the carcass but it was only feathers. He found the tracks of Boonie, our next door neighbor's raccoon, where she had dragged the bird over to their house. Boonie was brought to them as a baby so they hand-raised it. It's an indoor/outdoor coon and they feed it very well. That's why I didn't think she would go to the trouble of catching a chicken when she never wants for food. Obviously I was wrong. Lesson learned. I'll take extra measures to keep the flock safe.

I think you need to let your neighbor's know that their raccoon got your chicken too. Maybe they would keep it more indoors than out.

 

[aoxa]

I spent a half hour looking for that post and gave up. If I miss a couple days checking in here it becomes nearly impossible to keep up with every post. I try to answer questions if it's something I know about. It is good to post the question more than once if it seems it was overlooked in the swarm of daily postings.

Mumsy, post is bellow.

We lost all our six-week-old silkies but one. Another trip to the breeder later I'm back to having a brooder full of week and two-week old chicks (six silkies and three cochins), plus three five-week-old silkie chicks who we've put out with the rest of the flock of six and seven-week-old egg layers and the remaining silkie after introductions. So far, so good. Other than chasing around the younger ones when they've found something particularly yummy to eat, everyone gets along well. No bullying. Hopefully they'll be as accepting of the younger chicks when it comes time to put them in the coop.

The oldest silkie, Professor Fluffles, has kind of become the flock mascot. He's a very friendly little guy who will happily fall asleep on your lap. Of course, the gender's arbitrary right now, but he sure acts like a roo. I see him on watch a lot out in the chicken yard, especially when Cottonball, one of the five-week-old silkies is near him. But as I told the kids, he could very well turn out to be a hen. The funny thing is the silkies tend to like to hang out together, except Pinto the splash, who follows one of gold star pullets around.

Here's a shot of the Professor.

 

[moomoodiddy]

Should I use a black from a bbs pen for a cuckoo or paint pen or will blues start showing through

 

[Jharper]

It's a cuckoo that was from a cuckoo and cuckoo breeding none of te chicks got te cuckoo barring

Ohh

 

[sheeshshe]

Oooh! I could hear some tapping coming from under my hen!!!! yae!

 

[SilkieBaby81]

Thank you so much for your warm thoughts. My DH went under the house this morning to remove the carcass but it was only feathers. He found the tracks of Boonie, our next door neighbor's raccoon, where she had dragged the bird over to their house. Boonie was brought to them as a baby so they hand-raised it. It's an indoor/outdoor coon and they feed it very well. That's why I didn't think she would go to the trouble of catching a chicken when she never wants for food. Obviously I was wrong. Lesson learned. I'll take extra measures to keep the flock safe.

Boonie would be a dead raccoon if I would see it in my yard again...I don't believe in killing anything but that's your babies NOBODY messes with your babies

 

[SilkieBaby81]

Ok Day 19 and nothing yet, I know I know 21 days..

I'm going in the room every 10 mins peeping in (not opening) just peeping at the eggs. whispering "open open open" I'm still a nervous wreck lol. At this rate I'll be in a straight jacket by day 21. To Top it off my brother's girlfriend is going into the hospital to be indused for labor, my first nephew. But they live 1hr and a half away. When he told me that I was thinking, "but my eggs?!, I can't leave them" Shame on me lol

 

[Sanna]

I have two that came out of Catdance eggs marked 'BlS'. I assume it stands for Blue Split. The biggest chick might be male and has dark blue under fluff. The smallest is a female and has beautiful blue under fluff with black tips. They are under three months old.



Yesterday out in the garden. They do not appear to be splash but dark blue.

The 'BlS' on Karen's eggs is B/S which means blue/splash. You have two very nice blue chicks there.

Hey Sanna,
How excited am I!!! Went down to chicken coop and heard another cheep coming from little Snowy's pen. Yay!!! One of her little eggs had hatched into a beautiful little yellow chick!!! 5days overdue and all. Sooooo relieved and happy for her. I went to work this arvo so I don't know if the other hatched yet. Will have. Look in morning. How amazing that I decided to give the eggs another day or two. Phew!!!

That's great!! You know, I didn't even thing to mention this earlier. I had an EE chick that hatched 5 days later than the rest of the eggs. I had 4 eggs under my hens, 3 hatched on day 21 and 22 and this last egg showed no signs of hatching. I did candle it and I thought I saw some movement, so I left it with the hens. Kept checking on the egg every day, nothing. Four days later, the hens weren't really bothered with the egg, but guess what!? I had a pip! So I put it in the incubator with the eggs that were going on lock down that day. And the next day, the little chick was running around in the bator.

Post us pictures of your late bloomer(s)!

 

[sheeshshe]

WOW! who knew! I didn't know they could hatch that late, so crazy!