What are the trending breeds in your area right now?

[danceswithronin]

My Silkies get along with them fine, because they don't care about rank.

I'm glad to hear it since I plan on adding a few back into the flock at some point.

 

[Mybackyardpeepers]

I've since read from other people here that no matter the size of the hens, the senior ones will outrank the newcomers.

All my silkies are approximately the same age so at this point there is no rank thank goodness.

 

[Peepsi]

At the moment, Silkies are a hot fad though you wouldn't catch me dead with one. Blue egg layers, especially EE seem to be pretty big, too.
Always in high demand, but low supply are Mille Fleur d'Uccles.

Edit so people stop asking
I strongly dislike Silkies because they are walking swiffers and the roosters are mean as spit. And they are very dumb.

I am glad I'm not the only one with a strong dislike for silkies. They creep me out, and I can only imagine how dirty they get.

 

[danceswithronin]

I am glad I'm not the only one with a strong dislike for silkies. They creep me out, and I can only imagine how dirty they get.

You'd be surprised actually, I kept white silkies on mostly brown mulch last year that they regularly took dirt baths in and they still managed to stay sparkly white the overwhelming majority of the time with no intervention from me, don't even ask me how because I have no idea.

They do look like drowned rats in the rain though.

This is my flock at a year with zero pampering or baths necessary (one hen's top knot is dyed with Pick No More because I was trying to tell them apart to figure out who was laying and who wasn't):

 

[PNW_Peepers]

This is crazy to me literally none of my lavender or self blues have ever had ragged feathers except right before molt maybe from over breeding.

I have two lavender Orpington hens that are due for a molt and look a bit ragged but none of the others.

My porcelain D'uccle rooster wasn't (and he was hatchery)

My self blue oegb hen wasn't but I think her line was also breed with black.

My lavender Orpingtons from two lines(only have one hen left from one of the lines) weren't/aren't ragged either. Now one was bred with blacks but I know the other wasn't.

You’re the exception, I’ve had one Lavender Orp, and a self blue Ameraucana. Both had shredded feathers even after a molt. I culled the Lavender Orp, won’t breed the self blue. IMHO I feel like Lavenders for the most part are bred for color over other traits. Health, temperament, SOP, and egg production are put second.

 

[Cyprus]

I am glad I'm not the only one with a strong dislike for silkies. They creep me out, and I can only imagine how dirty they get.

I'm waiting for the fad to die so Silkies will become pretty much gone IMO they serve no purpose. Most aren't even good for show.

 

[Faraday40]

I strongly dislike Silkies because they are walking swiffers and the roosters are mean as spit. And they are very dumb.

Walking lint balls and roosters from hell

I admit that silkies are rather odd. I disliked the face-less birds and was creeped out by the 5 toes & black skin. Our daughter, however, was on a mission to get one. After 3 years of pleading, we allowed her to hatch some eggs. We kept 2 chicks and sold the rest. Both turned out to be female. AFTER having them, I can see why some people love them. I call them our "useless chickens," but secretly I like them. Our silkie hens are beyond cuddly.

I know if we bred silkies, they'd sell easily. We really only breed orps. Whenever we've had any pure silkie or even 1/2 silkie chicks available, they end up being sold immediately.

 

[danceswithronin]

I admit that silkies are rather odd. I disliked the face-less birds and was creeped out by the 5 toes & black skin. Our daughter, however, was on a mission to get one. After 3 years of pleading, we allowed her to hatch some eggs. We kept 2 chicks and sold the rest. Both turned out to be female. AFTER having them, I can see why some people love them. I call them our "useless chickens," but secretly I like them. Our silkie hens are beyond cuddly.

I know if we bred silkies, they'd sell easily. We really only breed orps. Whenever we've had any pure silkie or even 1/2 silkie chicks available, they end up being sold
immediately.

Silkies sell like hot cakes where I live too, but there is also a ton of them, so they're pretty devalued unless they are specialty colors, frizzles, or Polish crosses.

 

[chickendreams24]

Guilty. I'm a sucker for lavender types and have a lavender Orp on order as we speak (along with a blue and a buff).

They just look magical to me. They make me think of marble and silver mink stoles. The color makes them look so luxuriously soft for some reason.

I do love lavenders too..apparently though mine are odd in that they have nice feathers. LOL

I actually find this conversation quite intriguing.
His parents are from different sellers, but technically related. One is Porcelain and one lavender blue. Both from Aubrey Webb, but the porcelain actually was bought by someone and raised for a while until I bought it in a trade of roosters. Both from Aubrey Webb.
So I honestly have no idea.
I'm hoping the lavender blue will stop eating her eggs so I can actually hatch some blues, like I got last year. The only reason I kept that lavender in the first place was I thought he might also be blue. Nope.
Once I get blue maybe I'll finally just sell those lavenders. Or I could keep breeding and get mottled.

I'm not familiar at all with the term lavender blue is this only a D'Anver thing? Would you mind explaining and sharing photos of her?

Also for the eggs eating try putting some ceramic eggs in there with her(basically eggs she can't eat and gives up) also try upping her protein if she's only on layer feed which is usually 16%. Some birds are just egg eaters some do it out of boredom and it's very hard to break. Sometimes impossible.

Really? My porcelain d'Uccles were.

That's so strange. Yeah we only had the one D'Uccle cockeral but he wasn't at all. We lost him at nearly a year in a freak accident that broke his neck. I've wanted to add more since him sometime.

He actually defended me against a sebright rooster(had to be a mix but was from a hatchery as he was almost large fowl sized and wasn't henny feathered) He also was darker than any other golden laced sebright I've seen. The sebright was relentless and psychotically aggressive after puberty it was like the flip of a switch one day. He would attack us if we walked outside at all.

I plan to keep them in a separate coop/run next to my larger breeds.

Sone people say they can't be but my silkies do just fine with large fowl birds. They're even living with 5 turkeys right now the oldest of which are nearly a year.

My Silkies get along with them fine, because they don't care about rank.

Although my silkies aren't aggressive they aren't afraid of fights(most of them) and hold their own well. They range in the pecking order with several being quite high up.

You’re the exception, I’ve had one Lavender Orp, and a self blue Ameraucana. Both had shredded feathers even after a molt. I culled the Lavender Orp, won’t breed the self blue. IMHO I feel like Lavenders for the most part are bred for color over other traits. Health, temperament, SOP, and egg production are put second.

LoL I'll take that as a compliment.

Really though I'm very surprised as like I said I've never had trouble with my lavenders' feathers.

That said we do breed for temperament and health. Not that we don't breed for the other things too but by keeping the birds we do and free ranging and emphasizing temperament as one of the top spots we broke 200 birds(this number includes cockerals grown out for meat) last year all free ranging together from multpile coops except for grow outs and breeding groups(only separated for breeding)

I think of last summer we had to separate five overly amorous cockerals from the hens and pullets. Now the ones that we still have are big in their britches(winter crept up on us last fall before we could finish processing) and need to be separated and then processed but they're still not people aggressive or dog aggressive. They are also good predator decoys all summer. That may sound cruel but better to lose a bird headed for the freezer than a breeder.

Anyways yes my point is I can totally see that people wouldn't know or wouldn't care that blacks need to be included to keep the line healthy simply because they can sell the lavenders for more. Sadly.

 

[Amer]

I'm waiting for the fad to die so Silkies will become pretty much gone IMO they serve no purpose. Most aren't even good for show.

I don't think Silkies will ever be gone.

I admit that silkies are rather odd. I disliked the face-less birds and was creeped out by the 5 toes & black skin. Our daughter, however, was on a mission to get one. After 3 years of pleading, we allowed her to hatch some eggs. We kept 2 chicks and sold the rest. Both turned out to be female. AFTER having them, I can see why some people love them. I call them our "useless chickens," but secretly I like them. Our silkie hens are beyond cuddly.

I know if we bred silkies, they'd sell easily. We really only breed orps. Whenever we've had any pure silkie or even 1/2 silkie chicks available, they end up being sold immediately.

Same though. I kinda like Ashe, even though I don't like Silkies. They're so dumb people like them.

I do love lavenders too..apparently though mine are odd in that they have nice feathers. LOL



I'm not familiar at all with the term lavender blue is this only a D'Anver thing? Would you mind explaining and sharing photos of her?

Also for the eggs eating try putting some ceramic eggs in there with her(basically eggs she can't eat and gives up) also try upping her protein if she's only on layer feed which is usually 16%. Some birds are just egg eaters some do it out of boredom and it's very hard to break. Sometimes impossible.



That's so strange. Yeah we only had the one D'Uccle cockeral but he wasn't at all. We lost him at nearly a year in a freak accident that broke his neck. I've wanted to add more since him sometime.

He actually defended me against a sebright rooster(had to be a mix but was from a hatchery as he was almost large fowl sized and wasn't henny feathered) He also was darker than any other golden laced sebright I've seen. The sebright was relentless and psychotically aggressive after puberty it was like the flip of a switch one day. He would attack us if we walked outside at all.



Sone people say they can't be but my silkies do just fine with large fowl birds. They're even living with 5 turkeys right now the oldest of which are nearly a year.



Although my silkies aren't aggressive they aren't afraid of fights(most of them) and hold their own well. They range in the pecking order with several being quite high up.



LoL I'll take that as a compliment.

Really though I'm very surprised as like I said I've never had trouble with my lavenders' feathers.

That said we do breed for temperament and health. Not that we don't breed for the other things too but by keeping the birds we do and free ranging and emphasizing temperament as one of the top spots we broke 200 birds(this number includes cockerals grown out for meat) last year all free ranging together from multpile coops except for grow outs and breeding groups(only separated for breeding)

I think of last summer we had to separate five overly amorous cockerals from the hens and pullets. Now the ones that we still have are big in their britches(winter crept up on us last fall before we could finish processing) and need to be separated and then processed but they're still not people aggressive or dog aggressive. They are also good predator decoys all summer. That may sound cruel but better to lose a bird headed for the freezer than a breeder.

Anyways yes my point is I can totally see that people wouldn't know or wouldn't care that blacks need to be included to keep the line healthy simply because they can sell the lavenders for more. Sadly.

Lavender blue is the name I came up for a chicken that expresses both lavender and blue. I hatched blues last year, and realised one of my chickens had it. I knew it couldn't be the blacks or cuckoo or porcelain, and realised it was the so called "self-blue" hen. Now I just call her by the genetic name to save us some confusion.
Also you have no idea. I tried so much to break her. At least she's in a cage instead of eating everyone's eggs. Except the only cuckoo's.