Only two months ago Ebony the Black Pekin Bantam was Mum to four gorgeous little bundles of fluff. They were sold as pure bred Silkie chicks. (There were two others but sadly they died within days of coming home with us from the auction.)
A week or so after that first photo 'Tabby' looked like this ....
... now she's a big fluffy girl.
Grey Boy looked like this ...
.... then whoosh, now every day is a bad hair day!!
Snow White looked like this ....
..... then she went all 'can't do a thing with it' fluffy and bold as brass.
Flash was a mere tiddler ....
... now what a handsome little bird.
Although I am not at all convinced this is a Silkie at all, I'll have to do a bit of research here I think.
When pecking in the grass with Mum you can see they are all the same size. In fact our lovely neighbours who looked after the birds while we were away were not sure which was Mum and which were chicks!!
They are totally brave mixing with the 'big girls' and Caldwell the cockerel for the first time this week. We wanted to supervise the introductions so we held off opening the outer door of the Eglu until we got back. It all went well with the bigger chickens accepting the chicks into the flock and Mum having only a few minor tussles with some of our shall we say 'stroppier' girls.
Now they are like little roadrunners, running this way and that and tiring poor Mama out, can you see that hassled 'Mum's had enough' look in her eyes, poor thing.
Each night they all take themselves back to bed in the Eglu and sleep separate from the rest of the flock, banding together as a little family, it's lovely to see. They will be allowed to do this for as long as they want to, if they choose to sleep in the henhouse it will be when they want to.
A little bit of 'live action', just for you.
Scroll down to see today's 'housey' post :-)
Sue xx
Fun when they tell you one thing and they turn out to be something else !
ReplyDeleteI raise Frizzles and Silkies and several other breeds but I mention the frizzle and silkies for reference.
Look to me like three of them are silkies and the last handsome fellow may be a cross. It it possible that they are all crosses as if you breed silkies to frizzles, some will have silky feather ,some have frizzle feathers and some will look a bit mish mashed but fun :) Your handsome chick , now almost grown looks like there is a possibility of being a Roo ??
Will keep checking in to see the outcome.
Well spotted for some reason I've been calling them Frizzles for the last couple of days, although they ARE down in my diary as Silkies.... ooops, totally blonde moment ... serves me right for dyeing my hair !!
DeleteNow you HAVE to tell me what is a Roo :-)
hee hee "Roo" is short for rooster , sorry farm slang :))
DeleteAha .... now I see, we seldom call them roosters in this country hence my confusion ;-)
DeleteI've got 4 young bantam crosses that I got from a friend in the summer when they were about 9 weeks old. Now they are 19 weeks old and one of them is a cockerel and looks very very similar to your young male. Fortunately, as I live in the suburbs, he hardly ever crows, Long may it continue or he'll come to a sticky end. I've only heard him crow twice and my husband four times (as he is around during the day more than me). Even first thing in the morning, he keeps quiet.
ReplyDeleteI'm just amused that my pekin cross looks so very similar to yours. I'm hoping that it won't be long until the girls start to lay because my youngest other hens are VERY middleaged and not laying many at all now we are in autumn : )
They look lovely whichever breed they are.
ReplyDeleteThey are very cute, whatever they are! I know nowt about chickens.......love the noise they make too...so soothing. Look forward to seeing them grow.
ReplyDeleteThey are all fabulous but I have fallen in love with Flash! Just gorgeous. x
ReplyDeleteOh poor Mum, she does look whacked.
ReplyDeleteSuch lovely chickies, lucky you.
ReplyDelete