I have two blue silkies and a light buff. The blue and buff hens were housed together with my blue roo, but I moved the buff hen out so I could isolate the eggs from the two blues. We had a desperately broody bantam cochin (from a little flock with no roos) and so I took a few of the eggs from the buff silkie hen (AFTER she was separated from the blues) for the broody to sit on. I'm certain they were the buff silkie's eggs because she lays strangely oblong shaped eggs and the d'Uccles eggs (who I had moved her in with) are much tinier. Only two of the four eggs eventually hatched and one was the expected 'faux' partridge (muddy buff), BUT the other chick was the most outstanding, pure light blue color I have ever seen. The chick had black skin and five toes, so I'm pretty sure it was all silkie (and also assuming, that with only four days, the d'Uccle roo wasn't the father - but I'm a relative newbie to this so who knows). SADLY, I found the chick dead on the second morning so will not get to see how it would have grown out.
So my question is, is there any hidden gene thing that could be going on with the buff and the blue that could have given me this outstandingly pure blue chick? Don't know if Jennifer (Ultasol) is out there reading posts at the moment but the blue roo, which I got from her at 2010 Spring Stevenson show, is the likely dad and the buff is one I picked up at the same show which supposedly had some black leakage from a few generations back (though I'm hard pressed to see the black feathers
. Seven chicks eventually hatched from the two blue silkies, and though there are several blues in the batch (a few which may be fairly light), none of them had the very pure (almost magical) light blue hue that this chick had.
Could it have been a lavender? And if so, what would the likely resulting percentage be if I allowed the buff and blue to breed next Spring? Just so sorry I lost the chick, and wishing I might have a few more some day. (It was careless of me really, this bantam cochin is not nearly as gentle with her broods as the silkie moms and I've had this trouble with her before.)
So my question is, is there any hidden gene thing that could be going on with the buff and the blue that could have given me this outstandingly pure blue chick? Don't know if Jennifer (Ultasol) is out there reading posts at the moment but the blue roo, which I got from her at 2010 Spring Stevenson show, is the likely dad and the buff is one I picked up at the same show which supposedly had some black leakage from a few generations back (though I'm hard pressed to see the black feathers
. Seven chicks eventually hatched from the two blue silkies, and though there are several blues in the batch (a few which may be fairly light), none of them had the very pure (almost magical) light blue hue that this chick had.Could it have been a lavender? And if so, what would the likely resulting percentage be if I allowed the buff and blue to breed next Spring? Just so sorry I lost the chick, and wishing I might have a few more some day. (It was careless of me really, this bantam cochin is not nearly as gentle with her broods as the silkie moms and I've had this trouble with her before.)
