Julianna Varno – Showman of Showman, 1st Bantam Hen – Wayne County Fair 2022
It’s that time of year where I get inquiries for fair birds and youth shows.
Selling to 4Hers and Youth can be a mixed bag. I absolutely LOVE working with kids. They are excited about the birds! They are eager to learn. It’s just a good time. Sometimes the parents are cool. I met one of my dearest friends when she came to buy 4H birds for her daughter. Sometimes, they are a nightmare to work with because they don’t care about the bird, they want to buy a ribbon for their kid and want to use my bird to do it. My daughter did 4H so I completely understand that. However, there are a lot of things to consider when making this purchase and specifically, from a Gray Silkie breeder.
- I show myself. I rarely sell hatching eggs or chicks because I grow the birds out myself so that I can keep the best for myself. I am halfway to getting my ASBC Master Breeder in Gray. There is no amount of money in the world that you can offer me for my best birds. It’s literally in my will that my Gray lines will be given to a specific person when I die and are not to be sold. I can sell you a good pullet. I can tell you how to improve the bird and sell you an accompanying cock bird in order to do it. I am not selling you a Show Quality Gray hen. I do not even work on making SOP colored Gray males. It’s pointless. They don’t breed true. I would love to have a discussion with whoever wrote the SOP for Gray. That is a post for another time…
- Gray is one of THE HARDEST varieties to breed in silkies. It is not a variety that you start with, especially when you are young. It’s a very good way to discourage them from continuing with the fancy. You not only have to perfect Type (How a bird is physically built), Color (Shade of Gray), and Pattern (chinchilla, wing striping), you also have to have multiple breeding pens with multiple cocks that are not SOP colored birds in order to make a SOP bird for showing. If your child is serious about working on Gray, you have to have multiple pens, a Gray Silkie mentor, and LOTS of patience. I cull 60% of birds so they will also have to be willing to sell/ cull/ give away a lot birds to work on this variety. That means growing them out (paying for feed for the bird’s first 5-6 months). Having to deal with a lot of roosters. Have a place to get rid of roosters like a livestock auction. And be willing to deal with the general public in order to sell the culls. It’s a lot of work for a little person who probably is in multiple clubs and sports.
- Judges RARELY pick Gray for Reserve and Best of Breed and above. I had to show for 4 years before I achieved that status. I’ve had 4Hers do it with my Gray Line but she had to work on the line for 3 years before she got to that level. You aren’t going to buy a ribbon from me. You probably arent going to buy a ribbon from any Gray breeder unless everyone else brings hatchery stock to the fair. If you want to win, go find a really nice White or Black silkie. Those varieties win 90% of the time, even in Open class for adults. I will be happy to refer you to those breeders
- In the event I do have a SQ hen/ pullet I am willing to part with, it will not be cheap. I, myself, am a 4H parent. I have spent 50% of my monthly income on a hog before. I have gone to auctions where the top lamb went for $21,000 and was way out of my range. I went to the breeder at auction close and bought a lamb for $600 and held it on my lap for the 4 hour drive home. High prices are part of the show world. If you can’t afford a $100-$200 bird, then your options are either take what you can get; buy hatching eggs; get a male bird. “It’s not fair! I can’t afford it!” does not pay my $350 monthly electric bill, $200 monthly vaccine bill, $400 monthly feed bill, thousands I have spent traveling to shows to learn more about breeding/ showing silkies. I gave away a lot of really nice birds when I first started out and watched as the kids used them for one year, let them free range in mud and destroyed their feathers, and get eaten by wild life. Life is not fair. Life is not cheap. I didn’t put 8 years of breeding to make a nice show quality bird for you to let it get eaten by a raccoon the week after fair, negating any chance it’ll ever have of reproducing.
- I am not taking new mentees at this time. It’s my daughter’s last year of high school. I’ve spent the last 5-10 years volunteering on all kinds of committees, unpaid club positions, non-profits etc. I’ve officially resigned from all of them effective Feb 1st, 2023. I want to hang out with my family. I want to have time to spend with my daughter before she goes off to college. I want to have lunch with my mom and drive around with my husband on mini adventures. I will continue with the 4H kids I have now because I love them dearly. I just don’t want to commit to new people that I know I don’t have the time to properly commit to.
- Please do not buy a Pet Quality bird from me at a swap and then take it to an ABA/APA sanctioned non-fair show, find me in an aisle, and proceed to cuss me out when your kid gets dead last. This has happened on more than one occasion. There is a vast difference between a bird that has no disqualifications and a show quality bird. If I sell you a $40 pullet that has no DQs, it is still a $40 pullet that will not get disqualified. There are kids that travel that with their parents all over the US. They have purchased birds from 40 year old lines where the cock birds are worth $350 and the hens $500. You bought a discount swap bird that is a cull. If you want to be able to tell the difference, please purchase a Standard of Perfection from the ABA or the APA and start going to shows. Looking at birds on the internet is not the same as seeing them in person and talking to the breeders who made them. Yes! It makes a difference if the breeder shows or not. “Breeders” who never leave their farm can only see as far their barn. Period.
- Please stop asking to walk around my barn and see my stock. When I originally built my breeding pens, I made an areas where customers can come in and look at birds at a table. Fast forward 6 years worth of wide spread Avian Influenza, a Fowl Pox and Marek’s scare (Thank you, Ohio Nationals!), while also dealing with various strains of Cocci, Mycoplasma, and ILT being passed around shows – NO ONE comes in my silkie area anymore. The only people I let in my barn either have my lines so they have my germs, my travel partners, and my NPIP tester. I fully understand you want to see what you are buying. I am happy to bring examples out to the picnic area near the front of my property. Do not go in my barn, I will never sell you another bird and probably kick you off my property.
All of that aside, 4H is an amazing program and I don’t want to deter anyone from trying it out. Please understand all of the above before wanting to purchase from me. This wasn’t my most upbeat of articles. I honestly do love my 4Hers. The photo at the beginning of the article is Julianna Varno. That kid works so hard and I am SO PROUD of her. She started off buying chicks and eggs from me. She drives up to my farm once or twice a year and hauls all of her birds up so we can go through them and look at each one. She studies her Standard of Perfection. I always give her more eggs and cock birds to go home with and she has learned how to breed and improve the lines herself. You can quiz that girl on any terminology and she knows the definitions from the SOP. She makes my heart so full!! She is great example of how 4H allows good kids to develop into great adults. She has worked for every ribbon, every trophy she has ever won. That is the TRUE purpose of 4H. <3
