Silkies 101 - 20 of the most common Silkie questions...

[walkswithdog]

And I was sitting here feeling nuts because I have a pair of serama hens on a pile of eggs in the house... I don't feel nearly so nuts now...

 

[destiny_56085]

I converted 1 of my old aviaries into 1 big pen for the older chicks. I have another huge tv box that hold the middle group. I'm prepared with 5-6 of the huge rubbermaid tubs for next few batches. I also have 2 huge dog kennels that are on standby. I've been setting 3-6 dozen eggs per week and right about now I'm not too disappointed if alot of eggs candle clear. Funny part is that this doubles as a chick setup in spring and prep room for getting show birds ready in fall. Between mine and my 4-H girl's, I had to bathe and prep 56 silkies for a show in October. I even managed to have 10-11 roosters in the house for a week without killing anyone.

I'm used to cleaning. I go through alot of sawdust and daily cleaning to keep smells down. You kinda get used to dusting a few times a week and I ruin more vaccuums than most people. I also have 2 Amazon parrots, a couple cages of white doves, and a huge 10'longx5'highx3'wide aviary for finches, canaries, and diamond doves. My 1 year old lab/great dane mix still hasn't gotten over shredding any paper he can get his mouth on. Some days my parrots get teed off over something and fling their feed dishes across the room too.

I do sell off alot of chicks as spring progresses. These are the ones right now I am picking keepers out for the fall shows though. When the weather gets above freezing I can move some of the older chicks out to the garageand barn pens. The first swaps start on Feb. 7th and all the culls go to them. Just wait til the peafowl, turkeys, pheasants, quail, ducks, and geese start laying too.

Spring is a busy time!

 

[RooptyDoo]

Does anyone else have problems with fertility during winter. It has been extremely cold here and I have been putting every egg they lay in the bator and so far nothing seems to be growing. I was having great fertility till it got really cold. Basically what I am asking is, is this normal?

 

[Poulets De Cajun]

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Extremely....

 

[Sonoran Silkies]

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In all of your assorted breeding projects, what colors HAVEN'T you had?

Red just showed up from my buffs--it wasn't a project. Somehow they missed out on the dilution genes

The only pink ones I've had were from koolade; but I heard of a theory on how to bred a pink chicken. I'm debating it.

BTW, Remember the project you were interested in? I have gotten some as a by-product of my chocolate (dun) project.

 

[destiny_56085]

Same here. Eggs are half froze by the time I get them in the house. This time of the year we feed alot of cracked corn just to keep the birds alive. Its lower in protein but high in energy/heat. Its been 10-30 below 0 here for about a week and a half though. Less activity period when it gets like this.... They are concentrating on huddling together to stay warm and worrying a lil less about breeding right now. Less hours of daylight.... I have certain older roosters that are only fertile certain times of the year to start with. Have you trimmed crests and cushions? That is usually a given here or I get less than 10% fertility too. Unless you want to tackle AI, a scissors is your friend.

Lots of different variables....

 

[RooptyDoo]

Glad to know that this is something that others are experiencing too. I was hoping that it was the cold and not anything else. They seem to be as happy and healthy as ever, just bad fertility on the eggs. We are also feeding scratch just to give them something to do to warm up and I was concerned that this might be affecting their fertility. They don't get a lot, just a good sprinkle once a day to keep them busy and turn the bedding over. I had read somewhere that scratch grains can lower the fertiliy. They LOVE it, we call it their "candy"!

 

[Sonoran Silkies]

SOY lowers fertility. Add some animal protein--cat food, dog food, leftover steak

tuna fish, etc. It isn't the scratch itself, but the lower protein level, and any soy, if present.

 

[walkswithdog]

I usually switch to both the higher protein feeds when it gets icy like this and add a good bit of scratch for heat production. So far that's worked and our fertility hasn't been all that bad. Even out doors, I've had six of eight hatch, and incubated still getting 70/80 %. I've some probably frozen or almost frozen eggs in the bator but don't expect much from them at all, found them late.

 

[Poulets De Cajun]

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Email Donny (the guy who created the lavenders) about the pink. He supposedly knows how they can be done.

PM'ing you about the rest.