# No toenail



## Overmountain1 (Jun 5, 2020)

I have one little girl who was, apparently, born missing a toenail! Just discovered this on a check today! Hadn’t looked for it specifically and those foot feathers hid it so… check her out! This is little Miss Maribelle, or just Belle. That last one on the right side there has no nail. It’s odd!


----------



## robin416 (Sep 8, 2013)

That would actually happen frequently with Silkies. I never looked to see why it happened.


----------



## Poultry Judge (Jul 15, 2020)

robin416 said:


> That would actually happen frequently with Silkies. I never looked to see why it happened.


Happens with peafowl too, occasionally a bird will lose a toenail, they take a long time to grow back, if and when they do.


----------



## danathome (Sep 14, 2020)

What they said. Very common-it may have hatched that way, but more likely the nail got caught in something... and gone.


----------



## Overmountain1 (Jun 5, 2020)

danathome said:


> What they said. Very common-it may have hatched that way, but more likely the nail got caught in something... and gone.


I’m not sure there is anything there for it to have gotten caught on for this little one yet: not impossible, just improbable.  

Plus, the others who have torn one off before I have always still seen the quick of the nail or nail bed at the end. There is zero indication of one for her, so pretty sure she was just born this way. It amuses me! She’s so adorable.
They all are but I’m biased!


----------



## danathome (Sep 14, 2020)

The missing toe nail will not matter one bit. Two more red phoenix chicks hatched today; yeah. My beautiful red Phoenix rooster was recently killed so I'm looking forward to every one of his chicks that hatch. It would be nice if one turns out to be a cockerel as great as the dad.


----------



## Animals45 (May 11, 2021)

That's funny cause I have one without a toenail too. But now she is growing it back and it seems to be out of place, oddly...


----------



## robin416 (Sep 8, 2013)

Like I said earlier, I saw it with my Silkies. For some reason a nail never develops on the toe.


----------



## fuzzies (Jul 27, 2021)

I think it's one of the feather-leg genes that causes this in chickens, or at least a gene or genes closely associated with them. Purely speculation, but it seems to hold true in my experience. Many of my Cochin bantams are like this. No injury involved, they're just born without the toenail on the outer toe, and the outer toe is usually shorter or smaller than on clean-legged birds with similarly sized feet, too. Sometimes the toe is reduced in size, but still has a small nail present.

Cute bird! ❤ Is she a Porcelain d'Uccle?


----------



## Overmountain1 (Jun 5, 2020)

She sure is! Out of 17 birds, and some random eggs overall- the boys weren’t separated til later anyway- we got 2 of our Porcelain. All the rest are the OEGB rooster’s offspring. Surprising to us as we have 2/3 as porcelain hens. 

I learned that the Mille fleur gene is some sort of dominant genetic as well- all the rest- except one- are turning out as MF once combined with the OEG genetics. It’s been fun and we got a bunch of adorable little babies but I gotta find some more homes for the rest of these boys! Ah! Lol


----------



## fuzzies (Jul 27, 2021)

Depending on the variety of OEGB, that sounds right. The mottling gene that causes the white speckles on Mille Fleur patterned birds is recessive, though, so you'll likely notice them mature with more gold overall than their pure Mille Fleur parent. 😊

Oh, man, I can relate on the boys! I had a final total of 16 cockerels and 7 pullets out of the straight run chicks I hatched or bought this year, plus I'm suspicious of one of the three 'sexed pullets' that I got to kind of make up for that. 😩 I love having a brooder full of babies, but now they've grown up to be feisty and hormonal little punks. 🤣


----------



## robin416 (Sep 8, 2013)

Ha, it happened to me. Set a bunch of eggs. Out of what hatched 15 were males and either one or two females. So much time has gone by now I'm forgetting how many females but I'll never forget how many males.


----------



## fuzzies (Jul 27, 2021)

Yeah, it was a pretty disastrous hatching season like that for me this year. 🤣 It was all things like 7 Marans eggs set, one hatched, of course a cockerel. 15 (rather expensive) English Orpington eggs set, three hatched, all cockerels. 12 OEGB eggs set, five hatched, four cockerels and I lost the only pullet. 😩 Luckily my silkied Cochins were kind to me; 12 eggs set, 9 hatched, 5 pullets and 4 cockerels. 😍


----------



## Overmountain1 (Jun 5, 2020)

Ohhh we have similar tastes. Mr Dan gifted me with a Cochin who turned into a silkied Cochin unexpectedly. She’s soft like a poofy cloud all over, we just love her! She does bully the Ameraucana babies but I figure it won’t last much longer cause they’re gonna outgrow her- mostly they just run from her. Which is hilarious really. 

That’s great to know on the mottling gene and makes total sense; I was getting a rough impression of it playing out that way overall! 

That’s such a shame on the many cockerels- wow! You got me beat but not as terribly so! 4b/2g Ameraucana out of 11 set, 1 hatched but died. My nest eggs and what I added to incubator totaled closer to 25+, can’t recall the number exactly. I had good numbers though- must be the year of the OEGB hatch!  I got 10 girls and 7 boys out of them tho. Not bad for my first hatches for sure- but still more roos than I wanted, especially the Ameraucana hatch. My goal was 3 pullets added out of that but it’s ok. It’ll work out eventually. 

Oh and speaking of spangles and such- Hannah’s sure are coming in pretty! Can’t wait til she’s fully feathered back out.


----------



## fuzzies (Jul 27, 2021)

Oooh, yay!! The whole reason I joined here was because of mention of silkied Cochins! I've raised them for 5 years now and I just love my fuzzies!! 😁 They sure are sassy little squirts, though, aren't they? 🤣 From what I can tell from how many breeds spontaneously produce silkied variants, silkied feathering is a relatively common mutation as mutations go, and it's a recessive gene, so it's not unheard of that they pop out of non-silkied parents.

Congrats on the hatches and that's a pretty good ratio on your OEGBs! I raise OEGBs, Fawn Silver Duckwings specifically, so I actually hatch some of them every year. 😁 I don't even know what my goal was this year, I went a little chick crazy. 🤣 I guess all the cockerels were my punishment for not having more self-control!

Hannah is beauuutiful, by the way! 😍 Love that color!


----------



## robin416 (Sep 8, 2013)

Overmountain1 said:


> Ohhh we have similar tastes. Mr Dan gifted me with a Cochin who turned into a silkied Cochin unexpectedly. She’s soft like a poofy cloud all over, we just love her! She does bully the Ameraucana babies but I figure it won’t last much longer cause they’re gonna outgrow her- mostly they just run from her. Which is hilarious really.
> 
> That’s great to know on the mottling gene and makes total sense; I was getting a rough impression of it playing out that way overall!
> 
> ...


Liking Hannah a bunch myself.


----------



## robin416 (Sep 8, 2013)

fuzzies said:


> I don't even know what my goal was this year, I went a little chick crazy. 🤣 I guess all the cockerels were my punishment for not having more self-control!


LOL Maybe that's the answer. Scare us with all the little boys hatching to get us to stop.

It's as good a theory as any as I've ever heard.


----------



## Overmountain1 (Jun 5, 2020)

Thank you! She’s just a beautiful chicken to have in the yard, all around. She is sweet and a joy to watch run around with her snowshoes.  

I do, actually, only have the one OEGB, my (first pet) rooster Chip. He spoiled me and hooked me on roosters.  So, he lives with the D’Uccles, and that did include my D roo also until everyone started sitting nests… then someone had to be on top, so is what it is. Anyway- my little squirts are all little mixed buttheads but they’re adorable buttheads. 

I have noticed a lot of Cochin who look, sort of, half silkied- like their back half and bottom parts everywhere, but still harder feathers on wings and top areas. My girl is still fuzzy edged all over, and totally not water resistant. But her feathers do still have a shape- is this how it typically looks? Finding pictures online is HARD. you get Cochin. You get silkies. Let me see some of your beautiful ladies- and gents!  

Here is a pretty one of Hensleys feathers up closer… and these are her wing feathers too. She’s a poof. Anyway, it’s hard to find anything for comparison.


----------



## Overmountain1 (Jun 5, 2020)

Oh yeah! And here are a couple of Zero and Belle’s Daddy being a rotten boy…


----------



## robin416 (Sep 8, 2013)

Yep, so so rotten. I can see how rotten he is.


----------



## fuzzies (Jul 27, 2021)

Overmountain1 said:


> Here is a pretty one of Hensleys feathers up closer… and these are her wing feathers too. She’s a poof. Anyway, it’s hard to find anything for comparison.


Hensley is a gorgeous girl! 😍 However, she is not actually silkied. What the silkie gene does is it causes the feathers to develop without the microscopic hooks that hold them together in that feather shape, so the bird ends up looking like they have fur instead of feathers. The feathers don't have a defined shape like that.

What's interesting to me, though, is what you're describing about her feathers. The gene is considered recessive, but some people including myself have noticed that when you cross a silkied bird to a non-silkied bird, the offspring end up being softer and fluffier than their smooth-feathered parent, but still with defined feathers. Sounds a lot like what you're saying about Hensley!

I hear you on finding pictures of them! I don't think I have any actual close-ups of their feathers, but here are a few of my silkied Cochins that show what I mean about looking like fur. They are truly fuzzballs 🤣


----------



## fuzzies (Jul 27, 2021)

Also definitely agree on OEGB roosters! They are extraordinary boys! Mine like to keep their tough guy reputations in tact by displaying at me if I'm not holding them, but once I pick them up, they just turn to putty. 😍 Your d'Uccle boy is so adorable! I've never actually owned one, but I hear so many good things about d'Uccles. Guess I'll have to add them to my 'want list' for the future. 🤣


----------



## Overmountain1 (Jun 5, 2020)

Ok awesome! See, that was more what I expected to see at first, then she’s gotten these half shaped feathers all over, but then as I say, there were no real pictures on a general search. It IS interesting! I had thought she was a bit- off. Lol 
She stayed all fluff til the last little bit of her feathering out , and then they got more of a shape to them. But you can see- she’s also not truly hard feathered. We love it- it’s kind of velvety soft all over. I’ll have to see about zooming in even more so we can compare hers to ‘regular’ feathers. 

Your girls are _gorgeous_!! Love that, and hope to have a fully silkied girl someday. They’re a joy in personality as well. We call her puppy chicken- if she had paws and a tail it’d be wagging! She cannot run like everyone else due to her challenges when younger so she gallops everywhere now. Hilarious chicken all around.  

_THANK YOU_


----------



## robin416 (Sep 8, 2013)

I wonder, is it possible they used Cochins to develop paint Silkies? You mentioned that they are recessive white I began to think about how they became Silkied.


----------



## Overmountain1 (Jun 5, 2020)

Idk but here are some more closeups of her; 
ONLY the top layer has kept shape. Everything else is pure fluff. 
*I am not disputing what you said in the least, I simply find it intriguing how hers wound up this way; def a recessive gene poking through on her somehow to make it this way.


----------



## fuzzies (Jul 27, 2021)

robin416 said:


> I wonder, is it possible they used Cochins to develop paint Silkies? You mentioned that they are recessive white I began to think about how they became Silkied.


I don't think so? Cochins are recessive White from some preliminary searching on the subject. They'd be no good for making Paint Silkies, at least, though Silkie x Cochin bantam crosses _are _fairly common...

Silkied Cochins have no Silkie traits beyond the silkied feathering; no dark skin, no extra toe, no crest or beard, single combs, yellow skin, etc. I don't think they were bred from Silkies, as it would be a monumental effort to get all of those Silkie traits bred out, though admittedly not impossible. The two origin stories I've found for silkied Cochins involved spontaneous mutation; one out of a breeder's line of smooth Blacks, and one out of a hatchery line of frizzled Reds. Silkied Ameraucanas and Woolly Svart Hona are two others off the top of my head that had similar origins; they just randomly hatched out of smooth-feathered birds of the same breed with no influence from Silkies. That's what I meant when I said the silkie gene is a relatively common mutation.  Definitely doesn't mean you'll hatch silkieds out of smooths all the time, but it happens a lot considering the odds.





Overmountain1 said:


>


No worries, your bird definitely is unusual, so I understand being like 'hmm'. 🤣 Look at that poof! Makes me want to reach through the screen and snuggle her! 😍 They are such sweet and personable birds! Hard not to fall in love with the breed. ❤

There should be some fuzziness underneath on all chickens, as that's their insulation layer. I'll have to take a look at my smooth Cochins and silkie split bird tomorrow to compare, but I do see what you mean! I'd say there's a good chance she's a silkie split, or in other words she has one copy of the silkie gene. Not enough to be _fully _silkied, but enough to give her that extra softness. Fastest way to find out would be to cross her to a silkied male. Silkied Cochins are kinda hard to find, but the gene is the same as in Silkies, themselves, so even crossing to a Silkie rooster would work! Depending on where you are and when exactly you'd be looking for them, though, I might just be able to help you out in locating some silkied Cochins for your flock.


----------



## Overmountain1 (Jun 5, 2020)

That would be amazing- I had considered it and then thought- uh dude if I can’t even find pictures… where on earth to find a real silkied guy for her? 
I’m definitely not opposed but of course it wouldn’t be like, tomorrow that I’d be ready for that myself. As we both have learned from our crazy hatch years. I didn’t do too bad- I just let one group of pullets go that I should’ve waited to pair with these males. Oops. I also didn’t expect my BFF to ask for 3 pullets too. Obviously I couldn’t say no to her.  She will not take a rooster I have tried! She has brittle nerves so I know why. I think the right guy and it would be ok but it that’s always a gamble too. So anyway- I have a lot of roos, you have a lot of roos, but maybe by the fall or early spring we can reassess?? If the opportunity knocks sooner I’ll figure it out I think, but clearly some time would be better! 

She’s an odd little poof for sure- and it is her under feathers and more- no solid feathers to speak of, so yeah, she’s like a half silkied look, feel, and that would totally make sense. Neat how that plays out differently here n there!!


----------



## fuzzies (Jul 27, 2021)

They can be _so _hard to find! 😩 I got my original breeding pair from someone who was selling out of them entirely, so I started off with no leads. I had a few years where I thought I might be the only one left working with them, or at least the only one active online! I finally got a couple leads on other farms in this last year or so, thank goodness, so I can always send you their way if timing doesn't work out between us. 😊 I don't mind, I just want to see more of these precious birds out there with other people! ❤

Hensley's certainly a special girl! If we never figure out what genes she's hiding, that'd still be true. What a cutie! ❤


----------



## Overmountain1 (Jun 5, 2020)

Thank you! 
And truly- I would also love that. It’s just been a super crazy year, even not considering COVID! I’ve had 3 surgeries over the past year, in and out of ER several times for related stuff, truck engine blew. Need new home AC. Still need to finish the final big coops as originally planned but all these other things keep happening- and there’s only one of my husband! We don’t even have any siblings. 
Lol I hate it- and if I had a scrap of building ability- ok wait. If the materials were here I would’ve been out there first thing today doing it anyway, abilities can be learned right. But- the gravel is contingent on something else, then the coop, which is contingent on laying the concrete (not for run, just underneath coop as pad and surround) you get the idea though. It’s just been crazy. Factor in Covid and the homeschooling I’m starting back into soon…  

So I’m definitely interested. I would drive hours to lay hands on one or more in the future.  I hope we can get it worked out as well- they are truly beautiful, I think! I love the one off breeds and oddballs. I seem to have an affinity for them anyway! Oddballs and misfits galore!


----------



## danathome (Sep 14, 2020)

Hensley is a BLUE LACED COCHIN. Those cochin, I had, sure threw a lot of different colors and types. I kept two black pullets that are now turning splash.


----------



## fuzzies (Jul 27, 2021)

Overmountain1 said:


> I seem to have an affinity for them anyway! Oddballs and misfits galore!


Haha, I had a conversation with someone else not that long ago about how I have a knack for finding the weirdos of the chicken world! 🤣 I have everything from crowing hens to tailless Marans to birds like my Red Dorking hen, Perdita, with her twisted leg that she can't walk on. ❤

It really does sound like you've had a tough time of it lately! I hope things improve for you soon! ❤





danathome said:


> Those cochin, I had, sure threw a lot of different colors and types. I kept two black pullets that are now turning splash.


Oh, wow, that's really weird! 😲 I've heard of Black hens molting out into black and white patches somewhat reminiscent of Splash, but usually they're older when it happens! I'll bet they are super pretty, though!


----------



## courtness38128 (Jun 16, 2021)

One of mine has a crooked toe lol


----------



## Overmountain1 (Jun 5, 2020)

Oh my! 

Dan- excellent! She’s an oddball, but a beautiful fluffy one we sure do enjoy!  Those Cochin truly have kept you guessing all along, and this girl is beautiful now she’s finally grown into herself!


----------

