Silkie thread!

[silly4buttons]

Hi everyone

I would like to buy some bearded silkie eggs Any color But I love the white and bluff. Please pm me if you have any thank you

 

[mbbrinegar]

At what age can you usually tell the sex of a silkie?

 

[ChickNmamma]

At what age can you usually tell the sex of a silkie?

Um.. when they lay an egg - then you can be certain. Girls can crow.....

Actually I have one 7 week old I now know is a boy - all the others I am still guessing. SQ silkies you won't know until about 5 months or more - the boys will get streamers out of the back of their heads.. and possibly start crowing. The girls (usually) won't. Some have a difference in their head crests - the boys sweep back and the girls tilt forward. Some have difference in their beaks - really curved = boy, straighter = girl. All these methods are guaranteed to be 50% accurate...

Some people have become adept at spotting what is girl type and boy type - I am not one of those but I do guess with mine. I have two I go back and forth between boy-girl-boy-girl.. I guess I will know in 4 more months!

 

[OohLaLa]

Um.. when they lay an egg - then you can be certain. Girls can crow.....

Actually I have one 7 week old I now know is a boy - all the others I am still guessing. SQ silkies you won't know until about 5 months or more - the boys will get streamers out of the back of their heads.. and possibly start crowing. The girls (usually) won't. Some have a difference in their head crests - the boys sweep back and the girls tilt forward. Some have difference in their beaks - really curved = boy, straighter = girl. All these methods are guaranteed to be 50% accurate...

Some people have become adept at spotting what is girl type and boy type - I am not one of those but I do guess with mine. I have two I go back and forth between boy-girl-boy-girl.. I guess I will know in 4 more months!

I've adopted the "when they lay and egg" approach. I have 2 white silkies 12 weeks old and down in the brooder keeping company with some 3wk old assorted babies are a 5-6wk old Frizzle and Sizzle. Only the Frizzle makes me wonder because of the area above the beak into the hair line..It looks like a developing crown of a future king of the silkies lol.

 

[CookFarms]

Mud washes off; sap is likely to be more permanent.

Well, I'm not worried about it

 

[blipit007]

Polish and silkies always seem to get along very well

Good thing 'polkies' are pretty cute.


Glad your pair adopted the little pullet. That's why I love silkies, their personalities are so sweet and gentle. And the fact that they're adorable balls of fluff.

Your Polkie is really cute!

 

[mbbrinegar]

I was wondering because mine are 3 months old and they still look all alike. With the bantams I could tell by then. I'll just patiently wait.

 

[ChickNmamma]

I was wondering because mine are 3 months old and they still look all alike. With the bantams I could tell by then. I'll just patiently wait.

Patience is a virtue.. and a tough one to have!

The ones I am seeing changes on are now about 3 months old - but some birds just don't show anything for a long time. You can look at the birds and see if there is any growth on the comb. If you have beardless (I have both) the wattles on the boy started growing about 7 weeks. The one I am sure of now has a large comb, huge legs, dime size wattles (beardless), bright blue ears and definite streamers out the back of his head. The one I go back and forth doesn't have the correct comb (looks to be a pea comb - its a Sizzle cross and the two OUTSIDE ridges are growing?) and the streamers (if they are streamers and not crest growth) are not going back only - they are also going forward and straight up..

However the bird has the red patches on the wings that screams "Boy".. so I just don't know.

Here s/he is:

Born 5/8/2013 - so is almost 13 weeks.

If you want some help, you can always post pictures of your birds and have other people guess. Best pictures are profile of the whole bird standing normally on flat ground, and up close of head showing comb. Sometimes on the big poofy ones you can wet down their heads to see the combs better.

 

[Nikki816]

How many hens should a rooster ideally have for the best fertility? I don't have a lot of room and I'm wanting to only keep 2 roosters and I don't want to overextend them. I want to have a splash roo with blue/black hens and a blue roo with splash hens.
Or I am considering having 2 bachelor pens and rotating a couple hens through each pen at a time and keeping the rest in a bigger pens with the growing chick, but I'm not sure how well that would work. Any opinions?

 

[peepblessed]

How many hens should a rooster ideally have for the best fertility? I don't have a lot of room and I'm wanting to only keep 2 roosters and I don't want to overextend them. I want to have a splash roo with blue/black hens and a blue roo with splash hens.
Or I am considering having 2 bachelor pens and rotating a couple hens through each pen at a time and keeping the rest in a bigger pens with the growing chick, but I'm not sure how well that would work. Any opinions?

It depends on the roo. Some are very active and can and will cover 10 hens. Some are not active and 4 can be too many. Some boys have a couple of favorites that they make ragged and leave the others unfertile.