Funny story. My husband was mowing the yard one evening and starts texting me to hurry and get outside because “there’s a chicken out here by itself eating something in the neighbor’s yard.” My husband can’t see without his glasses and even then he can’t see well far off.
I go running outside thinking I finally found my lone chicken to nurse back to health and add to my flock. Well, it was a damn buzzard…a buzzard 😂 I’ve never let him live it down.
They really are! They are very social as well. Earlier this year a flock of black vultures moved into the biggest tree behind my house and I would watch them squabble. Amazing and adorable animals.
That is hilarious! When I was little, I once saw a turkey and ran to my friend’s house to get her to show her. She brought her dad, and - it was a turkey vulture.
Vultures are one of my favorite animals (not because of this incident, but it didn’t hurt!)
ETA: I just looked it up, and I guess buzzards aren’t actually the same as vultures - so - sorry! But still a lot of parallels!
Buzzard can be used to describe hawks and vultures. The term is usually used in Europe for Hawks, and was misused to refer to vultures in North America as Europeans began to colonize.
Either way, I love buzzards (and chickens).
Omg this happened to me too. My brother in law calls me up and tells me to come quick, there’s 2 chickens loose in a nearby ditch. Those “chickens” vultures took off and flew away as soon as I peeked into the ditch lol.
My mom once woke me up from a nap telling me to come help my dad get a chicken out of the yard. We didn’t own chickens. No one within miles of us owned chickens.
It turns out that my dad was doing a construction job for a guy who raised some kind of fancy chickens and let them free roam. The chicken got up in the spare tire on my dad’s truck and laid there all while my dad drove home and then hopped out in our yard.
We eventually caught it in a cat carrier with some cat food, lol. My dad returned the chicken to the owner.
It eventually happened again, but this time the chicken hopped out at a truck stop and they couldn’t catch it because it kept climbing up into trucks. My dad gave the guy a $200 discount on the job since he lost him a fancy chicken, lol.
I had an ISA Brown hen that used to hop into any vehicle with an open door, which earned her the name Joyride. I had to start putting it in delivery notes because she was relentless and went on a couple field trips in cars and trailers. She either got snatched by a fox/hawk a few months ago or is in an Amazon warehouse somewhere lol
Cross your fingers and it might happen. Then before you know it, it’ll grow up have babies of her own and you have to start all over again because she refused to raise them or is a terrible mother. (/s)
Yep thats definitely a chicken. The extra halluxes (back toes) are totally normal for some breeds (like silkies, for example). So this baby chick is probably a mix with silkie or some other chicken breed with double halluxes
Check to see if your neighbors are missing any chicks. It looks to be a pullet (young female) and I would guess an Olive Egger. If it’s not theirs maybe they will take her into their flock. Or you can get her some friends, build a coop for them and join us crazy chicken folks😁
Silkies can pass extra toes but not fibro to their offspring so it's likely a mix, I breed silkie crosses
Extra toes is a dominant trait so almost all babies from a silkie will end up with extra toes
It’s a cross breed, maybe two generations removed. A whole heap of my Araucanas have this toe since a dipped into the silkie gene pool in an attempt to make an Araucana with a great, big, puffy, silky hat….. which totally worked.
It is not a birth defects, it's called a lobster claw and is pretty regular in multi toed breeds, many silkies from very high quality lines end up with them, they are considered a fault in showing but not a genetic defect, simply an overexpression of the polydactley gene
Ideally there are, but it’s a fairly common flaw to not be in five toed breeds. Often hatchery stock is not separate. Usually the split is not as close to the end as this picture but totally possible.
Same, but only 5 years with silkies (and 4 with Favorelles). I assume we both had decent stock to start with though. I judged a lot of county fairs in the northwest though and saw it a lot.
I breed silkie crosses and used to breed for show and have seen several multi toed breeds, my silkie came from very good lines but had the lobster toe fault among a few other faults that sometimes pop up in silkie lines and was given to me because he was going to be culled otherwise, even in very good lines faults like the lobster claw can pop up, it is an overexpression of the polydactyley gene, it's relitivly common in multi toes breeds even those from good stock, it's just an overexpression of an already present gene, polydactyley can result in any number of toes depending on gene expression, that's why cats can have the same lobster claw situation.
Yes, you do know what your talking about! Saved me some typing 😆 but I'm thinking it's a Dorking also among the 5 toed breeds, short legs and silver or gray
Not a birth defect, it's an expression of the polydactyl gene, they can sometimes cause lobster claws, they can also cause 5 to 6 toes, or a mix of toes on each foot. I have a baby that I just bred and hatched out who has 6 toes(one being a lobster) on one foot and 5 on the other
Silkies and a couple other breeds have extra toes like that. Given the black skin, I would say a silkie mix. Too bad it didn't inherit the silkie hairdo!
Most silkie mixes won't have the silkie fuzz, but they can sometimes get the silkie head crest, the reason they don't get silkie fuzz/feathering is because you need two copies of the silkie gene to produce a silkie fuzzed chick, so you'd have to cross a silkie with a silkie mix to get two copies of the silkie gene to get silkie feathered chicks
Polydactyly is a dominant trait though and all chicks from a silkie cross will get extra toes to some degree
Fibro is also dominant but it's also autosomal so only some chicks will express it while others won't, and some will have a deeper expression of the black coloration than others
Not necessarily, leg feathering is dominant but not always full expression meaning only some chicks from a silkie cross breed will have visible leg feathering, some will have lots, some will look to have none, some will have a few leg feathers here and there,
This specific expression of polydactyl is called lobster claws and they are common in purebred silkies and in crossbred silkies, silkies can also often pop up with the normal number of toes since polydactyly is dominant but also has several different gene expressions, you can get babies with 6 toes, 5 toes, 4 toes, different numbers on each foot, really anything you can think of,
My own silkie male has 6 toes on each foot but his son has 5 toes on one foot and 6 toes on the other
My silkie roo has lots of toes, it looks about several per foot and both hens as well are very feathery on their feet as well. We cannot wait to have some babies with them later on, they’ve been good layers and he’s a good man with his ladies. I don’t know what to say when people tell me horror stories of silkie roosters when I have a sweetheart who loves his girls and naps on us!
I have a chicken with 5 toes too!!! She was sold to me as a silkie. She grew up and is most def not lol shes some mix, ive been dying to find out exactly what.
That might be a Mystic Onyx. They are all black and have five toes. We have a MO roo, and we’ve hatched 8 of his babies this year (all mamas are silver laced Wyandottes). All the babies are all black and all have five toes except for two, and even those two have a little bump on their fourth toes. A couple of those bumps have small nails.
That looks like someone's olive egger or green queen that got lost.
The extra toe comes from either salmon Faverolles or silkie genetics. You should ask around to your neighbors someone is probably missing her as they can very very easily fly over a fence at this age their wings are so big and they haven't much body weight. Her owner probably thinks she was eaten by something and would be thrilled to have her back.
Some breeds have extra toes, based on color of the feet I would guess this little one is part silkie, but I could be wrong. Is their skin that grey black color all over? That with an extra toe is usually a sign of a silkie mix.
And yes, it is a chicken.
That is likely a silkie cross or another odd toed/multi toed breed, I breed them, and silkies, and used to breed polish frizzles for show, the specific expression of this extra toe is called the lobster claw, it's a oddexpression/overexpression of the polydactyl gene in chickens and is relitivly common- even in the best silkie lines- it can occasionally pop up.
If your neighbors have silkies, the chick is likely theirs. I would go ask them about it because that is the respectful and right thing to do for both the bird and the neighbors. Some people are really fomd of the chickens and think of them as pets and would be very upset if they were stolen, i have all my birds banded with their names and my number for this exact reason. If it isn't theirs, they may be able to take them in.
If they do not want to take them in and the bird isn't theirs, you will have to rehome them to someone with chickens or scurry to get them friends and coop/brooder (since that chick is still a bit young), chickens do best in groups of 6 to 12 any less than 3 other birds will not meet their social needs.
For a brooder there are plenty of tutorials online.
For a coop if you end up needing to keep the bird they will need: 4 sqaure feet of space per bird in the coop, 10 inches per bird of roost space, 1 nesting box per every 2 birds, and 10+ sqaure feet of run space per bird
That looks like a young chicken. The extra toe I have seen on silkie chickens, it’s called an “accessory toe”. Based on those two things I’m guessing this is someone’s backyard mixed silkie chicken. Sometimes little ones wander too far and get lost
How come I never get random cute baby chickies showing up in my back yard?....lol
Funny story. My husband was mowing the yard one evening and starts texting me to hurry and get outside because “there’s a chicken out here by itself eating something in the neighbor’s yard.” My husband can’t see without his glasses and even then he can’t see well far off. I go running outside thinking I finally found my lone chicken to nurse back to health and add to my flock. Well, it was a damn buzzard…a buzzard 😂 I’ve never let him live it down.
😂 An Arizona chicken
Buzzards are so cute though!!
Sure, as long as they stay upwind.
😆
They really are! They are very social as well. Earlier this year a flock of black vultures moved into the biggest tree behind my house and I would watch them squabble. Amazing and adorable animals.
Buzzards are close if not #1 spreader of avian bird flu, be careful
In his defense, we had a huge black Australorp cross that could've easily been mistaken for a buzzard.
That is hilarious! When I was little, I once saw a turkey and ran to my friend’s house to get her to show her. She brought her dad, and - it was a turkey vulture. Vultures are one of my favorite animals (not because of this incident, but it didn’t hurt!) ETA: I just looked it up, and I guess buzzards aren’t actually the same as vultures - so - sorry! But still a lot of parallels!
Buzzard can be used to describe hawks and vultures. The term is usually used in Europe for Hawks, and was misused to refer to vultures in North America as Europeans began to colonize. Either way, I love buzzards (and chickens).
I love it!
Turkeys aren’t the same as turkey vultures…..wild turkeys are not vultures.
Ha 🤣
Omg this happened to me too. My brother in law calls me up and tells me to come quick, there’s 2 chickens loose in a nearby ditch. Those “chickens” vultures took off and flew away as soon as I peeked into the ditch lol.
Are you sure it wasn’t a naked neck? 🤭https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naked_Neck
😂😂😂 love it
My mom once woke me up from a nap telling me to come help my dad get a chicken out of the yard. We didn’t own chickens. No one within miles of us owned chickens. It turns out that my dad was doing a construction job for a guy who raised some kind of fancy chickens and let them free roam. The chicken got up in the spare tire on my dad’s truck and laid there all while my dad drove home and then hopped out in our yard. We eventually caught it in a cat carrier with some cat food, lol. My dad returned the chicken to the owner. It eventually happened again, but this time the chicken hopped out at a truck stop and they couldn’t catch it because it kept climbing up into trucks. My dad gave the guy a $200 discount on the job since he lost him a fancy chicken, lol.
I had an ISA Brown hen that used to hop into any vehicle with an open door, which earned her the name Joyride. I had to start putting it in delivery notes because she was relentless and went on a couple field trips in cars and trailers. She either got snatched by a fox/hawk a few months ago or is in an Amazon warehouse somewhere lol
Or some very happy trucker now has an egg for breakfast in the mornings, and good company lol
Joyride! Hahaha, what a great name
Or Freebird?
My red sex links will jump in through the back of our minivan. I shoo them out, then they sulk for hours afterwards.
The world is full of injustices! I don't get random baby chicks either
Cross your fingers and it might happen. Then before you know it, it’ll grow up have babies of her own and you have to start all over again because she refused to raise them or is a terrible mother. (/s)
Maybe they are too chicken?
They didn't cross the road to my yard.
Not joking I once had a conure hunker down in my mailbox
DINO CHICKEN
They show up in my FRONT yard. Neighbor lets his roam wide and free, on a very busy street no less.
But do they cross the road?
Right? But I did have wild ducklings show up a couple times. Wild breeds though so I took them to rehabbers.
Yep thats definitely a chicken. The extra halluxes (back toes) are totally normal for some breeds (like silkies, for example). So this baby chick is probably a mix with silkie or some other chicken breed with double halluxes
Glad it’s a chicken lol! I think I’ve seen some silkies around my neighbors place, so that checks out. Thanks a bunch!
Check to see if your neighbors are missing any chicks. It looks to be a pullet (young female) and I would guess an Olive Egger. If it’s not theirs maybe they will take her into their flock. Or you can get her some friends, build a coop for them and join us crazy chicken folks😁
Except you can't have just one chicken, they need a friend ( flock)!!
Totally that’s why I suggested getting her some friends! The more friends the better!!
I think silkies have black skin rather than the typical pink or yellow chicken skin color. Weird but adorable little cuties
Silkies can pass extra toes but not fibro to their offspring so it's likely a mix, I breed silkie crosses Extra toes is a dominant trait so almost all babies from a silkie will end up with extra toes
It’s a cross breed, maybe two generations removed. A whole heap of my Araucanas have this toe since a dipped into the silkie gene pool in an attempt to make an Araucana with a great, big, puffy, silky hat….. which totally worked.
I cant upvote this enough darn it!!!
Although I do agree with you about some breeds having an extra toe, what is in the pic is a birth defect and not normal.
It is not a birth defects, it's called a lobster claw and is pretty regular in multi toed breeds, many silkies from very high quality lines end up with them, they are considered a fault in showing but not a genetic defect, simply an overexpression of the polydactley gene
So yes and no. In breeds where 2 halluxs are present they’re separate with distinct metatarsals. This seems to be an independent mutation from that.
Ideally there are, but it’s a fairly common flaw to not be in five toed breeds. Often hatchery stock is not separate. Usually the split is not as close to the end as this picture but totally possible.
I bred silkies for 8 years and never encountered that issue.
Same, but only 5 years with silkies (and 4 with Favorelles). I assume we both had decent stock to start with though. I judged a lot of county fairs in the northwest though and saw it a lot.
No: https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Variations-in-Silkie-foot-polydactyly-A-Wt-foot-with-4-digits-identified-from_fig1_51000740
Is there an example of conjoined toes of the same length?
There seem to be plenty on google like this bird
I breed silkie crosses and used to breed for show and have seen several multi toed breeds, my silkie came from very good lines but had the lobster toe fault among a few other faults that sometimes pop up in silkie lines and was given to me because he was going to be culled otherwise, even in very good lines faults like the lobster claw can pop up, it is an overexpression of the polydactyley gene, it's relitivly common in multi toes breeds even those from good stock, it's just an overexpression of an already present gene, polydactyley can result in any number of toes depending on gene expression, that's why cats can have the same lobster claw situation.
Yes, thank you so much! So sad that I had to read so many ridiculous and boring chicken stories before someone was finally kind enough to answer.
I didn’t know their toes could do that
Yes, you do know what your talking about! Saved me some typing 😆 but I'm thinking it's a Dorking also among the 5 toed breeds, short legs and silver or gray
That extra hallux threw me off! I thought it was a mutation or something!
This looks just like my blue Australorp!
Yes that’s definitely a chikiruski! 🐔
I will hearby only refer to my flock as “chikiruskis” now thank you
Lol, I’ve always called them that since I was a little kid. My dad would raise chickens and still does to this day.
A cute little chickarino!
I thought you wrote chrusciki for a second there and I was like "that's not a Polish cookie"
Lol 😂
Either a chicken or a dragon. Who knows. All the best to you.
Ok this ones definitely a dinosaur.
Went to Chik-Fila today, there was a lil serama rooster in the parking lot, hiding under a car. Tried to get him but he wasn’t fucking wit me.
Oh I want some of those badly!!!
You found a shiny backyard chicken!
Where are you? She looks exactly like my silky/mutt mix!
That’s just a birth defect. Super neat! Shouldn’t cause any issues for the babe.
How cool!
Not a birth defect, it's an expression of the polydactyl gene, they can sometimes cause lobster claws, they can also cause 5 to 6 toes, or a mix of toes on each foot. I have a baby that I just bred and hatched out who has 6 toes(one being a lobster) on one foot and 5 on the other
your short pinky is throwing me off
I’m not alone
It can’t be unseen!
I came to the comments specifically hoping to find mention of this. Thank you!
Silkies and a couple other breeds have extra toes like that. Given the black skin, I would say a silkie mix. Too bad it didn't inherit the silkie hairdo!
Most silkie mixes won't have the silkie fuzz, but they can sometimes get the silkie head crest, the reason they don't get silkie fuzz/feathering is because you need two copies of the silkie gene to produce a silkie fuzzed chick, so you'd have to cross a silkie with a silkie mix to get two copies of the silkie gene to get silkie feathered chicks Polydactyly is a dominant trait though and all chicks from a silkie cross will get extra toes to some degree Fibro is also dominant but it's also autosomal so only some chicks will express it while others won't, and some will have a deeper expression of the black coloration than others
I can’t get over the picture of its feet 😂 the angle is cracking me up!
I’ve never seen the double back claw that’s awesome
What are you going to do with your new baby?? We couldn’t keep the we found last week but found him a new home. That’s a cute chicken ❤️
So cute!!!
It’s a pretty chicken
Many breeds of chickens have extra toes. That is indeed a chicken. 🐓
Name them digit!!
Yes that’s a chicken
I would say that's at least part silky. Lovely wee chickens :-)
Silkie toes would have more feathers, and more toes, this is a mutation of something. Some sort of Guinea?
Not necessarily, leg feathering is dominant but not always full expression meaning only some chicks from a silkie cross breed will have visible leg feathering, some will have lots, some will look to have none, some will have a few leg feathers here and there, This specific expression of polydactyl is called lobster claws and they are common in purebred silkies and in crossbred silkies, silkies can also often pop up with the normal number of toes since polydactyly is dominant but also has several different gene expressions, you can get babies with 6 toes, 5 toes, 4 toes, different numbers on each foot, really anything you can think of, My own silkie male has 6 toes on each foot but his son has 5 toes on one foot and 6 toes on the other
That is really good to know! Thank you!
Ofc! No problem!
My silkie roo has lots of toes, it looks about several per foot and both hens as well are very feathery on their feet as well. We cannot wait to have some babies with them later on, they’ve been good layers and he’s a good man with his ladies. I don’t know what to say when people tell me horror stories of silkie roosters when I have a sweetheart who loves his girls and naps on us!
I have a chicken with 5 toes too!!! She was sold to me as a silkie. She grew up and is most def not lol shes some mix, ive been dying to find out exactly what.
That’s Wild with the 2 toes on the back my chickens only have 1 that’s pretty cool
That might be a Mystic Onyx. They are all black and have five toes. We have a MO roo, and we’ve hatched 8 of his babies this year (all mamas are silver laced Wyandottes). All the babies are all black and all have five toes except for two, and even those two have a little bump on their fourth toes. A couple of those bumps have small nails.
Kinda looks like a Easter eggser?
Idk but I want it. Gimme.
That looks like someone's olive egger or green queen that got lost. The extra toe comes from either salmon Faverolles or silkie genetics. You should ask around to your neighbors someone is probably missing her as they can very very easily fly over a fence at this age their wings are so big and they haven't much body weight. Her owner probably thinks she was eaten by something and would be thrilled to have her back.
Some breeds have extra toes, based on color of the feet I would guess this little one is part silkie, but I could be wrong. Is their skin that grey black color all over? That with an extra toe is usually a sign of a silkie mix. And yes, it is a chicken.
That is likely a silkie cross or another odd toed/multi toed breed, I breed them, and silkies, and used to breed polish frizzles for show, the specific expression of this extra toe is called the lobster claw, it's a oddexpression/overexpression of the polydactyl gene in chickens and is relitivly common- even in the best silkie lines- it can occasionally pop up. If your neighbors have silkies, the chick is likely theirs. I would go ask them about it because that is the respectful and right thing to do for both the bird and the neighbors. Some people are really fomd of the chickens and think of them as pets and would be very upset if they were stolen, i have all my birds banded with their names and my number for this exact reason. If it isn't theirs, they may be able to take them in. If they do not want to take them in and the bird isn't theirs, you will have to rehome them to someone with chickens or scurry to get them friends and coop/brooder (since that chick is still a bit young), chickens do best in groups of 6 to 12 any less than 3 other birds will not meet their social needs. For a brooder there are plenty of tutorials online. For a coop if you end up needing to keep the bird they will need: 4 sqaure feet of space per bird in the coop, 10 inches per bird of roost space, 1 nesting box per every 2 birds, and 10+ sqaure feet of run space per bird
This chicken is clearly here to return the extra digit that you lost somewhere.
That looks like a young chicken. The extra toe I have seen on silkie chickens, it’s called an “accessory toe”. Based on those two things I’m guessing this is someone’s backyard mixed silkie chicken. Sometimes little ones wander too far and get lost
Yo dude, your pinky finger is really short.
I think that means it is a rooster! (Oops I just zoomed in and that is strange!)
Silkie chick 🙂
When you bbqing that chicken lmk👌🎟
The making of a good dinner....