100 mystery chicks!

I panicked when they arrived early, convinced they would die of dehydration(hey I do live in a desert) if I didn't get them into a brooder with water immediately. I dimwittedly put them all together, all at once and before I took note of what I have. On the plus side they all seem super perky now!

This was a heavy brown layer assortment, a rare breed assortment and some other pullets I purchased by breed (silver laced wyandottes, buff orpingtons, black Australorps, and rainbow chickens). I think I can still tell which ones are my specific breeds but I'm going a bit cross eyed. This is double the amount of birds I was expecting.

I messed up. Now it's all chicken roulette!


Someone guessed that the larger ones are white Plymouth rocks, which seems right. What in the world are these little grey ones then?

There's a bunch of these little saddled dudes




I snapped this of the rare breed before I dumped them in! I was almost thinking straight. Almost. What the heck are those reddish ones? I was hoping for fayoumis.


This is the heavy layer assortment - I think I know like one breed. Okay two. Maybe.

Things just went horribly wrong. I was so sick this past week I could barely move, and never got the boxes set up. I rallied today and was planning on getting everything set up - then a knock on the door. My laughing postman with a stack of cheeping boxes including birds I was not expecting until March that they filled early since I unwittingly said substitutions are fine as long as I get my order sooner. With my ten month old wailing for his nap and clinging to my legs I had to move our big wood brooder, hang lamps, run an extension cord because of course the outlet right there doesn't work now, get so, so, so many tiny beaks dunked in water and get everyone cozy. Checking butts, making sure everyone was drinking, dealing with two chicks with wry neck(one did not make it), generally running around in a frenzy. The baby screamed the whole time. I mean the whole time. My ears are still ringing. It's been a heck of a day. Let's play some chicken roulette!

What hatchery did you order them from?

I ordered chicks from Meyer's and had a brown layer assortment, when I asked what was included I was given the following link to help out.
https://meyerhatch.desk.com/customer/portal/articles/2142226-standard-chicks

In the brown layer assortment-
The black ones with the white dots on the back of the head will probly be barred.
The ones with the distinct brown arrow on top of the head may be Welsummers, or speckled sussex
I think I am seeing a few partrigde Cochins
The mostly blacks ones may be Australorps or Jersey Giants
Maybe a few Deleware or golden buffs or buff orps?
I am also see a couple red- could be production, rhode island or new hampshire

I ordered these guys from Hoover and they were supposed to give me a list of how many of each they included - they did not. I contacted them and was basically told tough luck. Ah well, random chickens are fun!

I had to look up partridge Cochin ... Omg cute. Those are a keeper.

Uhh, one of these things is not like the others....one of these things doesn't belong....

donrae said:

Uhh, one of these things is not like the others....one of these things doesn't belong....

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What gave her away? Was it the bill? She thinks she's a chicken. I try to put her with the ducks and she gets upset. There's always got to be one weirdo in the bunch.

Yeah, I think my bunches are mostly weirdos, so the one normal is the one that stands out

That stinks the customer service wasn't better :/ but cute babies!

Yellow with gray spots remind me of Salmon Favarolles (look for five toes and feathered legs)
Chipmunk colored may be Ameracaunas/Easter-Eggers (look for pea comb, green/blue/black legs)
Black with white spot on the head is likely a Barred Rock(yellow legs) or Cuckoo Maran(White/pale legs)

Kraken Farmer said:

Yellow with gray spots remind me of Salmon Favarolles (look for five toes and feathered legs)
Chipmunk colored may be Ameracaunas/Easter-Eggers (look for pea comb, green/blue/black legs)
Black with white spot on the head is likely a Barred Rock(yellow legs) or Cuckoo Maran(White/pale legs)

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Thank you! They do have feathered legs, I really should get better photos. I hope it's really a salmon favarolle because I wanted one so much. Some of the chipmunks are teeny, half the size of the rest easily. The others do look a lot like my adult Easter eggers did as babies. I love the crazy variety I would up with.

I have some of the penguin marked ones with black beaks and legs. What the heck are they? There's only a couple of them.

In case anyone was interested in my ongoing identification project - I found some houdans in there! At least I think so. Extra toes, crazy hair and all.

They look like they have a saddle and a dot on their head. My kids are trying to keep them all because of the wild hairdo! It just keeps getting poofier and they have beards, too. Stinkin adorable.