experiences with Ideal and/or Mt Healthy?

[McChooky]

I only got a couple eggs a day this winter but I only have 5 hens.

 

[Bound to Sea]

Wish I had more room for more!

I currently have splash silkie, 2 splash Australorps, 2 blue Amerucaunas, EE, BCM, RLBW, Bovan brown, Lohman white, black Amerucauna cross and a Plymouth barred rock..

 

[Bound to Sea]

I only got a couple eggs a day this winter but I only have 5 hens.

That's pretty good. What breeds?

 

[McChooky]

That's pretty good. What breeds?

10 month Dominique's thanks!

 

[McChooky]

10 month Dominique's thanks!

I'm hoping to cross them with a Delaware rooster so I can raise sex link meat birds. I'll keep the hens as layers if successful and eat the cockerels.

 

[Capricoco]

Hi there -- new to chickens and looking to start a small mixed flock of 8 of the basic backyard birds, and trying to decide where to order from.

I would like only 1-2 of each breed, so this eliminates hatcheries with a minimum requirement like Cackle and Hoover's. McMurray and Meyer do not have availability for my selection until June, which is much later than I would like to start.

My local feed store is ordering this year from Mt Healthy. Their shipment schedule just came out, the numbers are limited and the breeds I'd like are staggered over several weeks, skewing more March than April (March is early, it's usually still frozen here, and we still need to do the coop build!). So I've decided I would rather order myself and have all same-aged chicks arrive together, at a later spring date that better fits our planning.

Ideal also allows one or two birds of each breed, so that would work for me, and as of now they have ship availability that would work for me in late April.

I am in Connecticut. I understand Mt Healthy is in Ohio, so that would obviously be a shorter distance than from Ideal in Texas. I feel like Ideal is more popular, since I've read about them on this forum much more, and only heard of Mt Healthy yesterday. I did see the old news about the salmonella issues back in 2014, and wondered if that had ever recurred since.

What would you recommend? Thanks so much!

We ordered Turkey poults from ideal, it was frustrating to say the least. We received the order on time, but 2 poults were DOA, one had its guts spilling out, which from what I get is something they hatch with. There were no extras sent, in fact, we were shorted one breed entirely which we had ordered 3 of. It was a mess to sort out, and the next order there were 0 DOA and they were all healthy. Not sure what happened the first time, but I’m slightly wary to order from them ever again.

 

[nuthatched]

We ordered Turkey poults from ideal, it was frustrating to say the least. We received the order on time, but 2 poults were DOA, one had its guts spilling out, which from what I get is something they hatch with. There were no extras sent, in fact, we were shorted one breed entirely which we had ordered 3 of. It was a mess to sort out, and the next order there were 0 DOA and they were all healthy. Not sure what happened the first time, but I’m slightly wary to order from them ever again.

Sounds like a shipping issue to me.

 

[Capricoco]

Sounds like a shipping issue to me.

Doesn’t really explain the 3 shorted poults though.

 

[Bound to Sea]

Our chicks are coming from Ideal in April, to Canada, but we are buying/ ordering from a feed store. They will cost more with a middle man but that should alleviate sick ones, I hope. So sorry yours arrived in unsatisfactory conditions. I hope they compensate you appropriately.

 

[Capricoco]

Our chicks are coming from Ideal in April, to Canada, but we are buying/ ordering from a feed store. They will cost more with a middle man but that should alleviate sick ones, I hope. So sorry yours arrived in unsatisfactory conditions. I hope they compensate you appropriately.

They sent replacements so we ended up with almost every variety of turkey they had because we needed to fill the order. We ended up with 10 turkeys total and have 3 toms and 7 hens. So far the turkeys have been satisfactory, and a pretty new experience compared to chickens.