Silkie thread!

[Half Moon Ranch]

Silkie roos don't mind what size or colour the hen is. My white Silkie roo mated with my LF gold laced Wyandotte . This was the result. Wylkies!

Lol,so what do you call a cross between a silkie and an orpington?
Btw, beautiful family.

 

[howfunkyisurchicken]

Lol,so what do you call a cross between a silkie and an orpington?
Btw, beautiful family.

Here's a Silkie/Orp I used to have, we called him a Buff Puff (BP for short, may daughter named him, lol).

 

[katzbantams]

Here's a Silkie/Orp I used to have, we called him a Buff Puff (BP for short, may daughter named him, lol).

Super cute!

 

[workinnanie]

Buff Puff is adorable so is the goat!

I find it interesting that your silkie roosters breed other breeds. My two silkie boys prefer the silkie ladies! I have 4 barred rock gals & one easter egger. They all free range together.

 

[BobbieJo81]

Oh my, love that little one up the closest. Check out that fluffy
tail. And a beard?? Wow.

I swear when I saw this pic I thought for sure these were my babies...

 

[kabhyper1]

I'm beat. After about 3 hours total sleep helping the little chick last night, due to my own stupidity, and spending the day working on a friends alpaca farm for shearing day, ours and theirs, we are finally home. When we left this morning, I left her wet and weak under her mom, not knowing what to expect. We didn't get home until around 9:30 tonight, so I was nervous to look under Suki not knowing what I would find. I found this.....






I'm happy to report lucky number seven, or Seven as we call her, is doing wonderful, and is a gorgeous partridge. Sorry for the blurry pics, very tired tonight, but here she is!....

She is the one on the red plastic



Thanks so much everyone who helped me with her. I'm so relieved she is okay. At 4:45 this morning she was very dry in her shell and I questioned her survival. At 7:45 she was doing better and ready to go. She was cleared of her shell and very wet and weak with a bloody spot where her cord broke at 9:30 am, and when we left, sleeping under momma. Needless to say, baby chick or not, I was very nervous today. I love her. I will never prematurely try to help again! The other egg didn't make it. I suspected it was dead this morning, and when we got home I eggtopsied it. Must have been a mystery quitter. Fully developed splash. Bummer. Bitter sweet hatch, this one.

 

[John Simpson]

They are beautiful!!!!

 

[Sylvester017]

This is our first go at chickens, so are the buff orps broody from the onset of laying an egg, or only after leaving the eggs on the nest for while?
My other question is will a silkie roo try to fertilize the buffs?

We just plan to eat the eggs for a while, but maybe after a year or so and an addition on the coop and run, we might try hatching a few.

One thing is for sure, if the buffs cause trouble for our silkies I will have no trouble finding the guilty party a new home.
Maybe at that point we can take on an Ameraucana or two.
Right now we're having a bullying issue between two of our silkies that we haven't figured out yet.
I need to get pics of everyone and post them to get a best guess of who is who which might clear it up.
It seems like every question answered brings up four new ones! Lol

Oh, and I'm intrigued by blue eggs!

Congratulations on your chickeneering! I never had a Buff Orp and after my friend's experience with hers I probably never will - at least not around my Silkies. My friend had her Buff since it was day-old and it was over a year old before it went broody with puffing up while holding her wings out and growling. So my friend set eggs under her. She was a good momma but very offensively protective of the chicks. She went broody the following year but she was just allowed to sit out her broody time and not given any eggs to hatch. My friend re-homed several of her original flock but kept the Buff for her eggs. The Buff is very pushy but with no Bantams in the flock it is not a serious issue.

The Buffs are supposed to be good birds but I noticed in a youtube video how the Buffs as chicks were very aggressive towards White Leghorn chicks who were minding their own business foraging and towards juvenile ducklings who were just snoozing in the same pen. Buffs are very large birds and can cause quite a thump on the coop floor when they jump down from a roost. One fellow keeps his roosts a bit lower to accommodate both the large Buff and a couple of his Silkies.

All I can say is Buffs and Silkies are very broody breeds and all those hormones might come to blows someday LOL - the problem being that a 2.5-lb Silkie doesn't have a chance against a 6 or 7-lb aggressive challenger - you do the math. We had to re-home our 7-lb Marans who jumped on the back of our 2-lb Silkie pullet (6 months old) and dug her claws into it's back til it was screaming. You never saw a woman fly out the back door so fast as me. That Marans was isolated and gone the following morning to an egg seller. She was always a sneaky nipper at passersby so I wasn't sad re-homing her.

The White Leghorn went aggressive eventually even towards her best friend Partridge Silkie. They had been together since the first month we had them. But I couldn't risk the situation and sadly had to re-home her too. She was so sweet for almost 3 years and then changed. Now I only keep LF breeds under 5-lbs with gentle temperaments. Our Ameraucana is 5.5-lb and so far has stayed true to her gentle nature, is an alert forager, and is not a broody so we kept her. The other LF is a 4.5-lb Buff Leghorn who is calmer in temperament than the White or Brown Leghorn varieties. Next Spring I hope to try a couple of Breda pullets who weigh around 4-lb and are a very gentle tempered breed.

Hatching and chicks are fun but also heartbreaking as many times babies don't make it. Apparently there are a lot of issues with incubators with inexperienced chickeneers. Broody hens are the best way to hatch. Then there's the issue with shipped eggs whether they are really fertile or shook up during shipment. I am not going through that again. And what are we supposed to do with the excess roos? I don't have the heart to raise them for meat. And giving them away means they are someone else's meat

A Silkie boy, or any roo for that matter, will mate anything that will sit still for him. My Partridge boy kept hopping his sister several times a day and he must've had fun because he tried chasing my White Leghorn pullet who would have nothing to do with him! After his first day of over-mating his sister, we isolated him, and gave him back to the breeder the next day - he was supposed to be a "pullet" when first given to us and we are not zoned for crowing roos.

Sorry about the bullying issue you're having. It's a chicken thing!

Don't think the questions ever stop - LOL. I keep learning something new every time I go to one of these threads or do research. Every time someone recommends something I do research before trying it. DE was supposed to be so wonderful and yet there were a lot of disparaging arguments so I researched it for myself and chose to exercise on the side of caution and not use it - the label on the bag had more warnings than a bottle of lye. Same with what bedding to use in the nestbox, what style of box, how high a perch, how many square feet per chicken, what feed, what treats, what wormer, what lice control, what to use for mite prevention, free-range or not to, etc etc etc. I thought I was going to go nuts and started getting paranoid about what was good for my chickens. I've mellowed some and am comfortable with my health regimen now but still open to learning. I told my DH it's a wonder either my children or my chickens have lived through my experimental parenting! One thing I have never regretted is lining up a good vet that is either an avian exotic specialist or a vet knowledgeable in birds. Birds have the same symptoms for so many illnesses that only a qualified expert can diagnose. So many times I've been wrong thinking I knew what was ailing my bird and a vet visit set me straight!

I spent the $$$ through an Ameraucana breeder to get my guaranteed blue egg layer. I never knew what to expect about blue eggs. I was afraid the first light blue egg we got from our Ameraucana wasn't blue enough. Then I saw my friend's EE eggs that were definitely sage mint or had greenish tint to them compared to my pale blue egg. On the Ameraucana club website there is an egg color chart of all the various shades of blue a true Ameraucana can lay. So I'm satisfied with my girl - her color is in the C zone. Someday an EE might be in my flock except there's no guarantee on egg color. Still they are a colorful, talkative, kooky, alert, sweet mutt of a bird very similar to their cousin Ameraucanas.

 

[Cynthia12]

kab! Love your partridge. I took some photos for someone tonight of my babies that hatched about a week ago too.

Eyes shut..and looks like it is showing off any way.


Eyes open . . .

Quite the tops on these



A light splash


This photo is a bit blurry of a light blue..possible splash

Cutie babies...I just love the silkie!

 

[workinnanie]

Kabhyperey are all beautiful & so glad seven is doing so well!

Cynthia: Yours are so lovely as well! Silkies rule for sure!

Thanks for posting the pictures!