Chicken Memorials

[ellasflock]

Hi everyone,

So for a while now I have been wanting to hatch some chicks and I have finally got all the equipment I need. Which is great! 

I have a male Silkie Rooster and 2 Silkie hens, both of which, are not laying because of the weather, which is rather frustrating as I wanted to hatch some now, because the rest of my year is filled up with lots of other things and I feel like this is the best chance I have to give it a lot of attention to get it right.

However, I have realised that if I were to hatch a fertile egg from one of my hens then it might be a problem later on when she becomes mature and my rooster then wants to mate with her, and she is his offspring 😬

Obviously that isn’t morally right, but I was just thinking if it is better for me, if I get some from online and then hatch them. 

But I would love for my hen to raise her own chicks.

So my questions are, is it okay for me to hatch an offspring from my rooster and hen and then intertwine them, even though I know there is a possibility of him wanting to mate with her in the future?

And if I were to get some eggs online, would my silkie hen still want to raise them as her own if I introduce her to them young?

if anyone has hatched chicks before please let me know the best root to follow as I am all new to this!!

[Cat tails]

If you don’t hatch eggs from those hens in future, it will be fine. You might consider it incest, but it won’t lead to hereditary issues as long you don’t breed from her.
Don’t think a hen will be very likely to mother chicks she hasn’t hatched herself. So either use her as a broody or hatch and raise the chicks yourself.

[Cat tails]

What are your plans for the cockerels you might hatch?

[ellasflock]

Thanks that is great advice, I think I am going to get some from online. I think it would make life a lot easier and allow me to hatch in the future🙂

my plans for hatching a cockerel are quite straight forward because I live quite rurally and have lots of neighbours who are farmers and are always willing to take on a few cockerels to breed with, and I know in advanced that they have said they would happily take a rooster. If for some reason that wouldn’t pan out then I would maybe keep one because my current rooster is not dominant at all and doesn’t tend to mate my hens unless they are free roaming, which obviously he can’t at the moment because of lockdown, even then he doesn’t mate that much so having another cockerel wouldn’t be an issue for me, and I highly doubt they would fight because my rooster was raised amongst other coveralls before I bought him so he is used to the company. 
 

However my plan is definitely to either sell it, or give it to someone looking for a rooster. 
 

I know that some people think that killing them is the best idea but that is definitely not for me 😖 I think I am too much of an animal lover to do that!

If anyone else has hatched chicks before let me know how you did it!!

[Charlie the chook lady]

So I have 2 hens (1faverolles, 1 speckled sussex) and a roo(1 fav), all three were raised by a beautiful silkie mama "Tikka" who was a broody girl, my friend bought some chicks that she put under the gorgeous Tikka, who raised this ragtag motley crew brilliantly. (Only negative was we got a roo that was supposed to be a hen!)  Silkies are great mamas, and even though these weren't her eggs she raised them as her own, we had one fail, because of the silkie fluffy butt feathers, a chick hung itself unable to disentangle from the hairlike feathers, had heard that this can happen. (Tikka received an ever so gentle feathers trimming to reduce the long straggley bits) the rest were fine. Enjoy!