Silkie Bantam : Most Famous Bantam

Photo by : north60
History

This Bantam was introduced by Venice trader Marco Polo. This Bantam has been raised for more than 400 years in China. Chinese people raise the Silkie for its meat and eggs.
Anatomy
Silkie is a pure bantam. It has characteristics that is similar to bantam with its short body and short legs. Unlike other bantam or standard chicken, this chicken has five toes. The feet has thick feather.
The Roster has big rose comb like a king use big crown. The female has small rose comb. Some Silkie bantam has uncommon blue comb. The Silkie are either crested or non-crested. The crested is behind the comb. Some Silkie has bearded that cover the face.
Feathers
Silkie Bantam has different feather with common chicken feathers. The feather is similar to human or mammal hair. The feather is soft like silk. That is why people call the chicken Silkie Bantam. The feather structure of silkie is different with common chicken that has web like structure. Web like structure means, each feather strand rigidly adhering to the center shaft by a barb. Silkie has no barb, so their feathers are lose and floppy.
Coloring
The famous Silkie bantam color is white. Actually, there are other recognized color such as buff, black, blue, grey, and partridge.
Today, there are some color variations, such as, white splash, calico and others. The breeder crosses this funny chicken with other bantam to produce new color.
Skin
Most Silkie has white and yellow skin. There is some Silkie which has dark skin. The dark skin has dark meat and black bone. Chinese people make health soup with this meat and ginseng.
Characters
The Silkie is docile chicken. It is good for pet. The hen lays 250 eggs in a year. The hens go broody. The hens is good mother too that can care the baby.
The recognized color of Silkie
White Color

All the feathers are completely white in all section, from head to toes. White Silkie is the most famous Silkie bantam. People like its white clean feathers.
Buff Color
The Silkie has red brown or buff in color. There are black marking at the edge of the tail.
Black Color
The Chicken has black-green color in all section unless the feet. The beak and the face are black in color. Some black silkie has dominantly black color include the feet and the meat.
Partridge
This is the beautiful color to me. It is similar with red jungle fowl. The back of the neck is red or orange in color and the front of the neck is green beetle in color. The chest color is black beetle. The partridge has beautiful red or orange color in its saddle. The tail of the rooster is black beetle. The partridge hen is red bay and black in color.
Blue
Either the rooster or the hen has similar color marking. The chicken feather is bluish in color.
Gray
Some people are difficult to differentiate the gray and the blue. The roster is smoky gray in color while the hen is chinchilla color.

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