# Banty/large mating?



## Firefly (Dec 7, 2005)

If a banty hen (true banty, quite small) is mated with a full size roo, will the embryos develop and chicks survive? I hate to get another roo unless I have to but those eggs are awful tiny!


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## Karen in Alabam (Jul 21, 2010)

Won't a full sized rooster hurt a banty hen trying mate?

A lady I got some Silkie crosses from (who was selling chicks) said I couldn't have certain chicks because I had full sized roosters and they would break the backs of the smaller hens trying to mate.


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## April (Nov 28, 2006)

I've got some banty hens and large sized roos and have never had a problem with either hen injuries or chick rearing. In fact, I currently have a couple of banty something or other/barred rock cross hens that are very good layers.


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## Cyngbaeld (May 20, 2004)

The chick inside the shell will only grow to fit the shell. It has only that amount of nutrients to use for growing so it is impossible for it to get larger.

I have tiny hens running around, but I've never seen a large roo on one. I have seen my tiny roos trying to mate huge hens.


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## KSALguy (Feb 14, 2006)

we had some small silkies for a while back in Kansas, for a while we had to pen them up with the main flock, at that time we had a LARGE Partridge Cochin rooster, he was in with the laying flock, the little silkie hens were in there no problem, after we separated them back out into their own coop a couple of them went broody, one of the hens was allowed to hatch what we THOUGHT were pure silkie eggs considering the hens were so small and the only other rooster they would have been exposed to was the HUGE cochin and we never saw him mate them, but half of the chicks that came out of that nest of PURE silkie eggs were HALF cochin, they ended up being some weird medium sized birds kinda fluffy kinda scragly we sold them lol, but its more than possible for a full sized rooster to breed a bantam hen, 

BUT the catch is, if you have a flock of young hormone crazed roosters fighting over the ladys, or if you have a really stupid rough crazy rooster by him self, it doenst matter WHAT size the hens are, they CAN get hurt, 
if you have a flock with a dominant rooster that is gentle with his ladys and keeps any other rooster in line, then all hens can be bred safely, the only thing even I wouldnt attempt would be the TINY TINY ITSY BITSY MINI bantams that are like only a couple oz.'s, these birds are so freakishly small they should be kept by them self anyway, you might step on one lol,


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## lauriej57 (Nov 20, 2008)

Yes it is possible for a standard size hen to mate with a banty. I have one banty cochin, and all of my roosters have always mated with her. She is the only one that they haven't torn the feathers out of, but she is also the only hen I have who automatically squats when the roo comes near her. 

I did separate her from my young roo this fall, he was coming into his own, and the pullets his age weren't ready and the older girls wanted nothing to do with him, so he was on poor Cynda all the time, her and her 3 "large" 5 month old babies will be integrated back with the rest of the flock in the spring.


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## Firefly (Dec 7, 2005)

OK! I will hope for the best; my large cockerel is a Dorking so he's not huge. I'm getting some Silkies this week, a hen and 3 babies about 4 months old. Apparently it's hard to tell male from female at that age so I may end up with more roosters than I know what to do with! But I guess that's a good excuse to try black chicken meat...


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## KSALguy (Feb 14, 2006)

yeah they will be fine, but i have noticed that some roosters that are not used to seeing silkie hens unless they have a reason (low ranking rooster no access to normal hens) some wont realize they are hens for quite a while due to the fact silkies look so much differint,


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