Silkie thread!

[tjo804]

is this normal silkie behavior or should I separate this one for a while too?

any advise is greatly appreciated! she is 3 wk 6 days old.

 

[prizepete]

I don't know very much about skies, but I will try to help... what breeds do you have in with her, She might have brain damage from being pecked on the head by a bigger chicken

 

[tjo804]

4 standard cochin
4 bantam cochin
3 silkies
her

 

[tjo804]

brain damage was my thought.
can she still be ok? will this kill her?
should i remove the 4 standard cochins?

 

[tjo804]

i still have the second brooder set up from the packing peanuts that hurt little bear
the barreds are all gone to new homes

 

[Fancychooklady]

is this normal silkie behavior or should I separate this one for a while too? any advise is greatly appreciated! she is 3 wk 6 days old.

Head shaking can be the result of a few things. If you are feeding mash or anything moist they will shake even after they have removed debris from their beak. Upper respiratory issues , sinus and ear issues and of course cerebral hernia. Vaulted skulls are susceptible to peck injuries and the swelling of the brain can also occur on extremely hot days. If you suspect peck injury , yes separate.

 

[Sylvester017]

Sorry this is kind of off topic but if your water is so hard, have you considered a sediment filter and a water softener? Just seems the bottled water would get awfully expensive! I am trying to picture what your faucets, pipes, sink bowls look like!

Yes, in 30 years living here the expensive water softeners petered out, the water heaters get cruddy after only a couple years, the sink water purifiers don't last past 3 months - I'm not talking the filters give out - I'm talking the entire units crash and can't handle the mineral load so that the mechanisms corrode and start leaking all over the place. So we only use water for gardening or showers but for pets, cooking, and human consumption we have had to resort to bottled water. We have to keep about 10 each 5-gallon bottles around weekly.

On top of everything else our State has declared it's 4th year drought so the chlorine is very strong also. Our house was remodeled 2012 and the kitchen and bathroom faucets look 100 years old! The kitchen spigot and sink are crusted with dried minerals. We have to keep using lime cleaners just so it doesn't look gross. And yes, bottled water is expensive $50/month that we refill ourselves at water stations -- on top of that we pay the crappy water department $40 charges ($30 in general water district fees with only $10 or less of actual water use)!!!! The toilet bowl really gets crusty and we go thru a lot of cleaners. I used to use a de-mineralizer in the toilet bowl but the darn things are supposed to last a year and after 2 months in our water they're toast. Welcome to a drought State.

 

[tjo804]

Quote:
Thank you for your input I have 4 silkies and 4 bantam cochin in the brooder now took out the standard size gals. should I do just silkies in one and everyone else in the other? should I give her medicated chick feed some antibiotics or something else not sure what I could offer for swelling. I do know for a fact she got head pecked by one of the gold cochin standards. so they are in seperate brooder now .

 

[Sylvester017]

Hi, I'm new to chickens and have a question about my silkie. Her, hopefully a her, crest is starting to get in her face a bit and I have seen online people using tape to make a pony tail, but she's only 9 weeks old. Would it interfere with her feather growth? Should I just trim it?

I don't interfere to cut feathers on any of my breeds. I have 2 Silkie hens that surprisingly nibble the feathers around each other's eyes and don't bother picking any other feathers and they see fine. Eventually outdoor Silkie crests get matted or molt or clump and a soft damp washcloth cleans off the gunk and they're good to go again. As pullets is when my Silkies had the most obstructive crests but once they passed the pullet stage the crests didn't seem to be a bother. They've been outdoor free-range Silkies for 4 years now. I don't let them out in rainy muddy days because it's cold and their feathered feet get caked, otherwise they are outdoors and spot aerial predators sometimes before the bigger hard-feathered girls! Do as you wish with your bird but my experience is they don't need taping, tying, or cutting. My girls are no more or no less skittish whether they have a full crest or not.

 

[Fancychooklady]

Thank you for your input I have 4 silkies and 4 bantam cochin in the brooder now took out the standard size gals. should I do just silkies in one and everyone else in the other? should I give her medicated chick feed some antibiotics or something else not sure what I could offer for swelling. I do know for a fact she got head pecked by one of the gold cochin standards. so they are in seperate brooder now .

Medicated chick feed will only treat for coccocidiosis, so no point in starting them on that now. If the damage becomes more obvious you could research prednisone for the swelling and if you think that she is in any pain buffered aspirin is ok, but for now I would just wait and see. The bantams should be happy in their own area. Many people keep bantam and LF together but at the first sign of trouble segregation is recommended.
http://msucares.com/poultry/diseases/solutions.html