Tell me about Silver Seabrights...

[CrazyWestTexasFarmGirl]

Ok if i want them I can have an entire flock of silver seabrights. an adult Trio and a gazillion started youngsters... I like their little uprightly look and love silver laced...... But how are they temperament wise, healthwise, fertility and hatchability, hardiness, broodiness? Currently I have resisted Chicken Multiplication/Triplication (I am already beyond simple MATH)..... and they went home with a chicken friend who looked a little ill at how many there ended up being......(like 25-30 seabrights and like 15 RIR haha-) I have the option to retrieve some if I want. (oh yeah... they were and are FREE... hahaha so self control is even more serious here...)

So enablers..... shhhh..... I need input not encouragement....... I currently have lost count of how many chickens i have and my incubators are full and broodys on the nests...... so no enabling is needed.... haha I worry if I were to fall and hit my head the birds I laready have would devour me before I was found.....

 

[crystalchik]

Haha

, you poor thing! I know how you feel!

Sebrights from what Ive heard from the mouth of a breeder are called the "walking dead". Supposedly they are not very hardy birds. I had two, one died at a young age from a mild cold and the other got a very odd paralysis condition (wasnt Mereks). Now, Im not sure if I just coincidentily had very bad luck, but they were also flighty birds as well, they werent too much of the cuddly type.
Im sure someone else here with more experience will have more to say about them, but i usually turn beginning chicken owners (not saying you are) away from them as they are not the easiest to start out with. Personally though, if it were up to me, I would get more in a heart beat! (Im not encouraging, just my opinion

)

 

[AmberH]

I have also heard that they are a hard breed for beginners. I've gotten many, many chicks from people and only one ever survived. He looked like a Sebright only he was about the size of two put together. He was really friendly for a long time. He was probably a year old before he decided that he didn't like me anymore. I still loved him but two factors made me get rid of him. He liked to charge me and I was also getting rid of all my non-Cochins.

If I were you, I'd get them. But.... that's just me. lol I still really like Sebrights a lot. I think they're gorgeous birds.

 

[gryeyes]

I have two Silver Sebrights about 11 weeks old, and they're both roosters. Just beginning to crow - and I can't tell either one from the other because they aren't very cuddly so I don't get that close, intimacy I get with my other chickens of other breeds. I also have a Silver Sebright about 5, maybe 6 weeks old, and a Golden Sebright the same age (both are still in the brooder). I THINK those are both pullets. But who can tell until they either crow or lay an egg???

I love the way they look, the feathering and stance and how they move like prancing. But I don't know very much about them at all. (I was hoping this thread would fill in that gap!)

 

[Zahboo]

My sebrights were flighty and not loving, I didn't like them. Very off the wall birds, a little coocoo. Thought it was just the two so I got more, nope, still wacko.

 

[SilverPhoenix]

Sebrights are gorgeous birds, but definitely not the hardiest or friendliest breed around. I had three--two silvers and one golden--and the golden died of heat stroke unexpectedly when she was about three, one of the silvers just died mysteriously the other day at the age of four, and thankfully the last silver is still with me. Most of my chickens are very tame, but my sebrights are rather flighty. It's possible you could find a line of them that are friendlier--I have a bantam silver spangled hamburg that is absolutely the sweetest thing when I've heard nothing but bad things about their dispositions--but otherwise? They make nice eye candy, but I wouldn't expect cuddlers out of them. And they aren't the hardiest birds around, unfortunately. I'd still say it might be worth getting a few, though, they make such a pretty addition to a flock. Forming a whole flock of them might not be the best idea, though.

 

[Megs]

stunning birds with the lacing, and hen feathered roos, but they are very flighty. hardiness as a chick can depend on the line it comes from, i hatched about 50 of the lil buggers last year, hardly lost any, but my parent group were not show quality birds and fertility was exceptional. I did not lose any adult birds in the year i had them, they lasted the winter just find in an uninsulated/unheated coop, even with the temperature outside dipping as far as -8. I sold the flock this spring as i did not like how flighty they were, and the hens were plain nasty to each other.

 

[CrazyWestTexasFarmGirl]

hmm......
flighty.... now that I think about it these are pretty wild. The breeder doesnt handle his birds at all.
The main roo is known to have an attitude problem. I may pass since I have the silver laced cochins and all.....
I know he had golden seabrights popping out of his silvers and wasnt sure where that came from.... but he had a pretty closed and inbred flock of birds for about 3 years from what I can tell so I am thinking a recessive popping up from a little inbreeding?
I may just let my friend keep them and work on gentling the silver laced cochin youngsters I got from him. They are cute and cuddle and pretty....
Maybe I should just be good.... I need to get off my hiney and craigslist a hoard of LF mixbreed, buff orph and EE chicks and turkeys this weekend so im not so overrun and can walk in my rabbit barn without being mauled. *sigh* being good sure isnt fun.... but I already just bought 15 silver laced & a white cochin...... and I still need to sort out my Gold Laced Wyandottes and Im out of pens for them already....