Bay Area Silkies looking for a new home

Turns out that one of my fellow urban chicken farmers here in Redwood City has decided that seven chickens is a few too many to have in her backyard. So, she's looking to place three of her chooks with a caring home.

The kind of chickens she's got are a special breed called Silkie Bantams, and as you can see in the picture to the right (one I grabbed off the web, this is not one of the chickens up for adoption), they're not your prototypical run-of-the-coop egg layers (no offense to Sophia and ZsuZsu, our Plymouth Barred Rocks).

If you like the look of Silkies, be forewarned that they're more for looks than for egg production. So, you'll have a good looking flock in your backyard, but not so many fresh eggs in the kitchen. Why? From the American Silkie Bantam Club web site:

Because of [Silkies'] gentle and docile nature, they make wonderful pets and adapt quickly to attention and handling by people. Their tendencies towards broodiness or setting re unsurpassed and Silkie hens will hatch and raise most any kind of poultry or game fowl. Many breeders of quail or pheasant who prefer to hatch naturally as opposed to an incubator will keep a flock of Silkie hens for this purpose. Once a Silkie hen has decided to set her eggs, there is very little that will bring her from the nest until those eggs have hatched. They will even go broody without the presence of eggs.

If you ask me, there's something delightfully Dr. Seuss-ian about Silkies. If we didn't already have our two chooks, I'd be really tempted to pick up another chicken (that, and LeftcoastMom would rather we kept our flock at two.)

If you're interested in adopting these two-month-old chickens, please send an email to Aaron at aaronowie [at] yahoo [dot] com and let him know Urban Chickens sent you. :-)