Silkies are quite a bit tamer than most breeds.
Some just like being around people, especially if they were raised by hand.
I have a frizzle hen that is almost as bad. She lives on my back deck and is hand fed day and night. If something bothers her she will find me and complain.

 

Silkies are great.

 

Are they normally all this tame though? This girl is like a puppy. Makes me want to get more.

 

mine were never that friendly. She sounds like she learned from a cat

 

its partially that the breed is really tame by nature and that it was probably raised by hand with little exposure to alot of other birds,

 

As soon as I went out to do some work with her today, she ran over and flipped on her back in front of me, then jumped on my lap again and rolled over to fan out her wings while closing her eyes and resting her head on my hand.QUOTE]

I've seen this at a 4H poultry show. This girl flipped her chicken on its backside, and rubbed its belly and it went to sleep.
Maybe your bird is wanting you to rub its belly as its previous owner did.

 

Our siklies are sweet, I'd say but not like that. We have a couple of babies and it makes me think that we should start handling them more with hopes of getting a lap bird!

 

She must be sticking to me like glue to feel safe I guess, since she is kind of an outcast with the other birds right now. Hopefully she stays this sweet, but I have a feeling she may find other interests once she finds her place in the flock. Would be really cool if they were all always this puppy-like.

 

Sounds like she had been petted a LOT in her former home. I've had a few chickens that loveable, but only when I handled and petted them constantly from the time they were day old chicks.

They are more likely to be that way if they are with people more than they are with other chickens.

 

silkies in a mixed flock are often outsiders if the rest of the flock has never seen a silkie before, silkies act a bit differint than normal chickens it seems, i added a few silkies to my flock once, the silkies were an adult rooster and hen and four chicks which turned out to be three roosters and one pullet, my flock had never seen silkies and the silkies had never seen normal chickens, it was like they didnt know the others were chickens at all, my adult normal roosters never bred the silkie hens and the adult silkie rooster never tried the normal hens, but the three young silkie cockerals that grew up in the flock from a younger age figured it out, they would tag anything and were the most randy birds i have ever seen,

 

Oh, goodness, a topic on the chicken forum that I know something about!

If they are not handled, they will not act like this, but Silkies ARE more tame and gentle, naturally, than other breeds.We have handraised many breeds for tameness, but only the Silkies will act like a Cockatoo parrot from it, rolling over in hands and laps, almost if they wanted to be petted EVERYWHERE at once, and weren't sure how to get that feat accomplished.

Silkie roos are like that too, and are amazingly non-aggressive and sweet. They love to have their heads and necks scratched.

You have to kind of look at their origins for the explanation: Silkies were originally bred as living ornaments for the gardens of the Emperor of China. Since the gardens were where the Imperial ladies took their ease, these chickens had to be gentle, tame, pretty to look at and nice to hold... they had to ENJOY being handled, and be safe even for the smallest, Imperial child to pick up.

The LEAST tame of the roos my mother and I have bred would not peck you if you picked him up...even if he had currently been in the middle of chasing a hen.

The only difficulty we have ever had with them is that EVERYTHING will send the hens broody. If they can find a rock, they will sit it. If Mercury goes retrograde, they go broody.

My mother's little 6 week old hen that she is keeping out for the shows next year will step up on your hand on command, snuggle against your chest, and sing little chirp songs for you.

They actually forage quite well. I have seen Silkie hens go after a bull ant nest, and I thought they were going to dig to their homeland.

 

As soon as I went out to do some work with her today, she ran over and flipped on her back in front of me, then jumped on my lap again and rolled over to fan out her wings while closing her eyes and resting her head on my hand.QUOTE]

I've seen this at a 4H poultry show. This girl flipped her chicken on its backside, and rubbed its belly and it went to sleep.
Maybe your bird is wanting you to rub its belly as its previous owner did.

Any chicken will do that if you turn them over and rub their bellies. I have deen it done dozens of times and it's amazing and funny... They just do that, don't know why.

 

silkies in a mixed flock are often outsiders if the rest of the flock has never seen a silkie before, silkies act a bit differint than normal chickens it seems, i added a few silkies to my flock once, the silkies were an adult rooster and hen and four chicks which turned out to be three roosters and one pullet, my flock had never seen silkies and the silkies had never seen normal chickens, it was like they didnt know the others were chickens at all, my adult normal roosters never bred the silkie hens and the adult silkie rooster never tried the normal hens, but the three young silkie cockerals that grew up in the flock from a younger age figured it out, they would tag anything and were the most randy birds i have ever seen,

You brought up a good point. 3 days later and she is still staying seperated from the other birds. They don't seem to recognize each other as birds. I have to place her in the coop at night because she wanders out into the corner of the fence and sits in the cold grass all alone.

Do I need to give it a week or two, or should I add another Silkie hen for her? I don't want to add another silkie unless they will bond to each other.

Also, great info Calianne!

Thank you all for the info. I have always been fascinated with learning animal behaviour, and the info here will help a lot in the future too. I really appreciate it.

 

Silkies will bond to each other, and be friendly to one another. So if you get another Silkie hen, or a Silkie roo, they will stick together and avoid the other chickens.

We always kept our Silkies in a separate, much smaller coop, than the other chickens. Silkies don't tend to "roost" like other chickens. They are more likely to find the comfiest corner and snuggle up together in it, on the ground, like a litter of puppies. My theory (it is only a theory) is that the extra toe makes it more difficult for them to roost. Or course, it may also be that standard-sized roosts don't fit their feet very well, too. At any rate, while Silkies are tame, gentle, and non-aggressive to each other and other chickens, the reverse is not always true, and the bigger chickens will sometimes pick on them, especially if they feel the need to compete for food resources.

Watch out for foot problems. They can have all of the issues of other feather-footed breeds, plus added issues because they don't tend to roost (Not saying their are NO Silkies that roost, just that it is their tendency not to). Checking their feet regularly (which is easy to do when they are rolling around in your lap to get petted and scratched) will identify issues before they become a major problem.

Enjoy your Silkie(s). They tend to foster emotional attachments in their humans.

 

the only way my silkies would roost is if the roost was low enough to jump too, their wing feathers are "silkified" too so they cant fly, the adult hen i got that one time would never roost, but eventually the young birds learned how from example and i had a low enough spot to jump to and up from, for a while i kicked all four of the silkie roosters out of the main pen due to rooster crowding and they took up residence in the magnolia next to the pen, all the low branches gave a perfect stair step up, they never went over 3ft high though even though it would have been easy to keep going, there was a Sumatra rooster and his mate higher up in that same tree,

 

DW and I have Silkies, but they aren't that friendly. We first got a white Silkie roo and 7 hens (unrelated) last October to go with our first 6 pullets (2 each RIR, Buff Orpingtons, and Barred Rocks). Oh and one adult male lavender guinea. The next day (Sunday) the roo got his name: Cassanova, by virtue of having tried or succeeded in mounting EVERY other bird in the pen, whether Silkie or not, including the guinea!:clap:
Cassanova has been an outstanding rooster, being very protective of his girls, and he has sired several offspring. He is always ready, willing and able to nail any hen in range, even at risk of retribution from the big roos. He even has chased Bull, the Dark Brahma roo 'round the pen on more than one occasion.
And ditto on the broodiness of the hens. Best incubators around.

 

Silkies will bond to each other, and be friendly to one another. So if you get another Silkie hen, or a Silkie roo, they will stick together and avoid the other chickens.

We always kept our Silkies in a separate, much smaller coop, than the other chickens. Silkies don't tend to "roost" like other chickens. They are more likely to find the comfiest corner and snuggle up together in it, on the ground, like a litter of puppies. My theory (it is only a theory) is that the extra toe makes it more difficult for them to roost. Or course, it may also be that standard-sized roosts don't fit their feet very well, too. At any rate, while Silkies are tame, gentle, and non-aggressive to each other and other chickens, the reverse is not always true, and the bigger chickens will sometimes pick on them, especially if they feel the need to compete for food resources.

Watch out for foot problems. They can have all of the issues of other feather-footed breeds, plus added issues because they don't tend to roost (Not saying their are NO Silkies that roost, just that it is their tendency not to). Checking their feet regularly (which is easy to do when they are rolling around in your lap to get petted and scratched) will identify issues before they become a major problem.

Enjoy your Silkie(s). They tend to foster emotional attachments in their humans.

Thank you. I am currently looking for another hen for Little Girl and I think it will help her out a lot. Im afraid the shunning from the other chickens will make her vulnerable to stress or illness.