Silkies - They’re simply SPECTACULAR!

[LadiesAndJane]

Please post updates of their developments (with pictures )!

Of course!

What me? Post pictures?
I have to stop myself from posting too many.

 

[LynnaePB]

Do you all think my borderline 14 week old cockerel pullet is a cockerel now?? View attachment 2546771

View attachment 2546772

Although it's another sign that points more towards a male I've had my share of females who sparred with the males as youngsters. In fact some of my pullet chicks were worse than my cockerels and fought more so you never know! The most aggressive chick I ever had ended up being a pullet, I thought for sure she'd be male by her behavior! Luckily she grew out of her aggressive phase, it was no fun being attacked by her every time I interacted with the other chicks.

So here is the one little cutie all fluffed up. So tiny compared to the 10 day olds! She is on her own for a few days, so she has a stuffed animal friend to keep her company.View attachment 2549174

Here are the 10 day olds hanging out with us yesterday. I’ll wait a few days to put them all together.View attachment 2549176

Aww what precious little ones!

I'm sorry to hear the others that went into lockdown don't appear to have made it but congratulations on the one beautiful little chick! Shipped eggs are such a gamble, I've come to the conclusion that if I get even 1 live chick it was a success. It's especially tough losing them right at the end though (I can relate, lots of my shipped egg babies quit around day 19 right before absorbing their yolks). I hope your current shipped eggs hang in there for you and you don't lose too many during lockdown!

 

[LadiesAndJane]

Aww what precious little ones!

I'm sorry to hear the others that went into lockdown don't appear to have made it but congratulations on the one beautiful little chick! Shipped eggs are such a gamble, I've come to the conclusion that if I get even 1 live chick it was a success. It's especially tough losing them right at the end though (I can relate, lots of my shipped egg babies quit around day 19 right before absorbing their yolks). I hope your current shipped eggs hang in there for you and you don't lose too many during lockdown!

Thanks!
Yes, I am happy to have this little one, she is a little sweetie. It is sad when they make it though to day 19 and then just stop. The 5 from the other set are on day 11. They look good right now anyway. We will see.

 

[Chickeria]

Do you all think my borderline 14 week old cockerel pullet is a cockerel now?? View attachment 2546771

View attachment 2546772

I know it is completely out of context but the pictures made me laugh - the two in the background sparring like 'WHAM' 'POW' 'KAPOW' - - and the third one in the foreground is putting herself to bed

 

[LadiesAndJane]

So excited!

Just got the results back from the DNA testing on the three older chicks.
All three are female! So hard to rehome the mixed breed boys.
We were really hoping that Kinoko (the polish/silkie) was a female. Has the greatest personality already and my daughter just loves this one.
Hikari, the ameraucana/silkie cross was hatched from the last egg my Ameraucana laid the day we sold her.
Wanda/Akira (she has two names for some reason, from the mind of a 12 year old who is teaching herself Japanese at the moment) is the silkie from our own eggs that we kept.

 

[Chickeria]

I need your opinions please - I am in the process of ordering shipped eggs (bantam silkies), the eggs will have to cross one national border, I'm new to hatching chicks and a friend lends me his incubator (big one!). Originally I wanted to order 12 eggs. Then I spoke with the person who lend the incubator befor me, he incubated 30 shipped eggs (2 different breeds/no silkies) and 20 chicks hatched. When he heard I was going to order 12 he said urgently I should order more. So now I'm wondering if I should order 15 instead of 12. I asked the breeder about it and she told me it is always best to order more eggs than number of chicks wanted, but I have to decide myself which number.
I know no one can predict how many will hatch
I just feel a bit insecure at the moment with the decision. I'm grateful for any input

 

[LadiesAndJane]

I need your opinions please - I am in the process of ordering shipped eggs (bantam silkies), the eggs will have to cross one national border, I'm new to hatching chicks and a friend lends me his incubator (big one!). Originally I wanted to order 12 eggs. Then I spoke with the person who lend the incubator befor me, he incubated 30 shipped eggs (2 different breeds/no silkies) and 20 chicks hatched. When he heard I was going to order 12 he said urgently I should order more. So now I'm wondering if I should order 15 instead of 12. I asked the breeder about it and she told me it is always best to order more eggs than number of chicks wanted, but I have to decide myself which number.
I know no one can predict how many will hatch
I just feel a bit insecure at the moment with the decision. I'm grateful for any input

I would order more if you can afford it and have room in the incubator.
Shipped eggs are always risky. I have had hatch rates from 0% to 90%. So many factors involved. Mostly depends on the freshness of the eggs and how they were packed and handled under shipment. Asking the breeder to double box the eggs with some kind of cushioning between the box layers can help. The condition of the aircells when you get them seems to be the determining factor in my experience.
I just hatched 1 out of 10, these eggs were not packed that well. My current batch of 25 only has 5 remaining viable eggs at day 12. These eggs were packed beautifully and still had very disrupted aircells.
Last year I hatched 14/15 shipped silkie eggs, so really you never know.
So the point of all this is, hedge your bets and get a few more eggs if you can, ask the seller how they pack them. Ask for double boxing as this can help. Be ready though to have a plan if you are lucky and get a high hatch rate, and you have too many chicks!
Read this thread on hatching shipped eggs. It is very helpful.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/ar...hatching-chicken-eggs-aka-hatching-101.64195/

 

[LadiesAndJane]

Also,when you get your eggs, I recommend jumping on a hatch-a-long.
Many others incubating and hatching at the same time. Good place to get feed back and advice on problems that come up along the way, and of course post photos of all the chicks!
Big one coming up is the Easter Hatch-a-Long, but someone is usually hosting one every month on BYC.

 

[Chickeria]

LadiesAndJane thank you for your responses and your advices! And for the link for the thread on hatching shipped eggs - I will work through it. Yes joining a hatch-a-long is a great idea, I will do that

 

[LynnaePB]

I need your opinions please - I am in the process of ordering shipped eggs (bantam silkies), the eggs will have to cross one national border, I'm new to hatching chicks and a friend lends me his incubator (big one!). Originally I wanted to order 12 eggs. Then I spoke with the person who lend the incubator befor me, he incubated 30 shipped eggs (2 different breeds/no silkies) and 20 chicks hatched. When he heard I was going to order 12 he said urgently I should order more. So now I'm wondering if I should order 15 instead of 12. I asked the breeder about it and she told me it is always best to order more eggs than number of chicks wanted, but I have to decide myself which number.
I know no one can predict how many will hatch
I just feel a bit insecure at the moment with the decision. I'm grateful for any input

I would also say more is better with shipped eggs. 100% hatches can happen but with shipped eggs they are usually few and far between (I've had 7 of 8 eggs hatch once but still haven't got a 100% hatch myself from shipped eggs). A 50% hatch is considered good with shipped eggs. With how hard shipping seems to often be with them I consider anything hatched good.

I've got shipped silkie eggs 8 different times. Most packed very well. They usually ended up having loose and sometimes detached air cells. It didn't seem to make a huge difference in my hatch rates if they were from the same state or multiple states away (the one I got from the same state actually had the lowest hatch and they were packed beautifully).

From the 8 different batches I've got
25%, 33%, 40%, 87.5%, 72.2%, 13.3%, 37.5%, and 42.8% hatch rates. If I hadn't assisted with a lot of those the hatch rates would have been a decent amount lower. Things like letting the eggs rest at room temperature for 24+ hours and not turning the eggs for the first 2-3 days seemed to help increase my chances at a better hatch rate a bit (not always but with all the ones with a higher hatch rate that is what I did).

If you are open to assisting I would definitely suggest reading up on it and being prepared to help. I've found a lot of my shipped eggs needed assistance. There seemed to be a lot more malpositions that prevented external pipping. Unlike with local eggs that I've assisted the shipped egg babies that needed assistance didn't tend to have a greater chance at health issues after hatching than a chick who hatched successfully on its own.

Since I found such a great increase in malpositions that prevented external pips (like having a foot over the head) I always add a safety hole several hours after they internally pip just in case. It saved quite a few who I later found were malpositioned and it didn't seem to hinder the ones who weren't. This is a great article on assisted hatching that really helped me. https://www.backyardchickens.com/articles/guide-to-assisted-hatching-for-all-poultry.72886/