Anybody Else Waiitng [Im]patiently For Chicks?

[WRVgirl]

I'm about to lose my mind!

I have literally been pacing my house since yesterday morning. The chicks shipped on Monday; and the CSM I talked to said to expect them on Tuesday or Wednesday; but definitely before Thursday.

My mail lady comes between 10am-11am every single day without fail! Or course she didn't show until after 3pm yesterday! I'm hoping she's not late again today!

I've been trying not to run errands until after the mail lady comes by [I don't want the helpless babies to be left on my doorstep and me not be home]

I'm so excited AND nervous!

Anybody else waiting for chicks? I could really use some company! LMAO.

 

[Ben Rogers]

I was expecting my baby quail to arrive on Wednesday (today) but they called yesterday at 3pm to tell me they had arrived.

It's cool that your mail lady drops them to your door. I have to drive to the "main post office" for the area to pick mine up. They won't door-deliver live animals. (They do the same thing with bees when I order them--but then, I undestand being a little nervous about having 2000 singing insects buzzing in a screened-in box inside a mail truck...)

I have more chicks on order, but I know they won't hatch until late July, so my anxiousness is at a low point right now. It will build as I get closer to July 25th...

What kind of chicks do you have coming and from where?

 

[bruceha2000]

They deliver them in the mail truck? Around here they want you to pick them up at the P.O. ASAP and that makes the most sense to me. Don't want them taking the long and winding (and maybe too hot or cold) road to your house.

Who did you order from? I ordered from Ideal in Texas. They hatched Tues 2 weeks ago, shipped Wed and I picked them up Thursday 8 AM at the P.O. in Vermont. Would have been there at 6:30 as the P.O. prefers, but I had to skate from 6 to 7. Cute little suckers and they grow so fast! Yep, I'm a first time chick owner, can you tell?

Bruce

 

[WRVgirl]

Because we're one of the first stops, and because I called them to tell them that they were coming, they will get delivered to my house. I ordered from mypetchicken.com, because everywhere else I found online had a 25 chick order and it was going to be a straight run.

 

[WRVgirl]

I was expecting my baby quail to arrive on Wednesday (today) but they called yesterday at 3pm to tell me they had arrived.

It's cool that your mail lady drops them to your door. I have to drive to the "main post office" for the area to pick mine up. They won't door-deliver live animals. (They do the same thing with bees when I order them--but then, I undestand being a little nervous about having 2000 singing insects buzzing in a screened-in box inside a mail truck...)

I have more chicks on order, but I know they won't hatch until late July, so my anxiousness is at a low point right now. It will build as I get closer to July 25th...

What kind of chicks do you have coming and from where?

I [personally] have two white cochin coming. I ordered 3 buff stars for a friend, and one white crested black polish for another friend. Luckily I know some chicken people around here or I'd have to order 6+ chicks every time I wanted babies!

Mypetchicken.com has been awesome. I've called and changed my order with them like 3 times [rounding up the other people who wanted chicks and getting them to decide what they wanted from what the site had available, definitely took some work]

I ordered a new coop on amazon too, which should be here sometime in the next week [I wish that I was talented enough to build one on my own!

Ben, you keep bees?!?!?!
That's something that I've always wanted to do, but we live on only 3/4 acre and the other half says that's not enough room ;/ I have heard that bee keeping is awesome though! How do you do it without getting stung up?

 

[Ben Rogers]

I've had up to four hives. I wouldn't call myself a "successful" beekeeper, though--my hives are dead right now. The first ones died out in a really cold winter two years ago. The poor girls froze. And once they started freezing off, they didn't have enough internal heat to maintain the temps in the hives. Because I can't keep them on my property in the city (city ordnances make it prohibitive) I kept them at a friend's house.

Then I ordered replacements and they "failed to thrive". I don't know what the issue was--so I've let the hives go fallow for a year and I'm cleansing them to be sure there are no mites or disease in the hives themselves. I'll start them back again in the spring.

As for the stinging, I've only been stung three times--if you don't count the times they've hit my gloves while installing new brood.

Just don't go at the hives with a flashlight after dark. This pisses them off. I learned that the hard way.

Being stung is just part of the "joy" of raising bees. Most beekeepers I know are very blaze' about being stung. I'm still annoyed by it. However, I've also heard that it's really good for arthrititis, so it's not all bad.

My big issue is that since I started raising bees, I've gone "paleo" -- meaning that I avoid all sugar and grains. That is what lead me to free-ranging chickens and raising quail. It means my interest in bees is diminishing. However, they're still great pollinators and I can use *some* of their honey.

As for the space needed for bees--they range as far as 2 miles from the hive to find nectar and pollen. I think its entirely feasible to keep bees on 1/2 acre or less--as long as your neighbors don't complain and you don't have anyone with allergies who might sue you if they get stung (fewer than 4% have an allergy to bees--and an "allergy" is not "it hurts when I get stung" -- it's "I can't breathe, I go into anaphylactic shock and I die when I get stung". My father-in-law claims he is "allergic" because he "swells up" when he gets stung. Ayup. That's what happens when you get stung. No allergy there.)

Back to topic and chickens, however....

I currently have 35 little girls:

5 Cinnamon Queens, 5 Welsummers, 5 Dominiques, 5 Golden Laced Wyandottes and 15 Ameraucanas.

I have on order:

5 Black Australorp, 5 Rhode Island Red, 5 Brown Leghorn, 10 Buff Brahma (straight run) and 10 Red Jungle Fowl (straight run).

I'm only planning to keep 15 layers total--unless I can afford to build another coop in the next couple months.

The rest will go to a buddy's chicken tractors and raised until fall and then they'll be processed and stored away in the freezer for the winter. I make a point that my kiddos cannot name them until we pick which ones we're keeping.

My first batch of 25 were killed by my dog. *sigh* Still hurts. :'(

 

[WRVgirl]

I lost one of my orphington babies to my Aunt's dog...it still sucks! And unfortunately, that attack has really taken a toll on my trust in my own dogs [who have never so much as looked at my babies.

My neighbors have ponies and cows, so I can't imagine them complaining if I chose to keep bees; but it's got to be one expensive hobby at a time of my husband would have a heart attack.

Congratulations on the Paleo. I have some friends that swear by it, but when push comes to shove, I'm really just too lazy and undisciplined to do it.

I've currently got 22 silkie eggs in the incubator [I purchased 12 and the lady sent 22!] I know I can't keep all of them, no matter how tiny and sweet they are but I know I'll find them some good homes [luckily for my heart, they aren't meat chickens! lol]

 

[besjoux]

Finally got our chickies this morning. Picked them up at 4 AM! I gave up with USPS and was worried with the heat that they needed food and water ASAP. Are you following the tracking? They should have shipped express but that meant nothing for us, we get netflix faster than I got the chicks. Our chicks were mailed out Monday AM and didn't get to even close to our area until this morning. I wasn't going to wait to see how long it would take them to deliver to my local PO.

 

[TeePants]

Oh! I ordered from MyPetChicken too, but my chicks won't be shipping out until August 6th. I need to call my post office and see how they handle live animal shipments. We ordered in advance to give us time to get the coop/run going and set up a brooder in our garage.

We're getting 2 EEs, 2 Golden Sexlinks, 1 Wellsummer & 1 JG. Thank goodness for them letting us do smaller orders, and I hope everyone gets sexed right, as we can't keep roos where we live. Is it common for MPC to send 'extra' chicks on small orders?

& how often do small orders get pushed back? Was going to take that week off work so I could stay home with them for the first 5 days or so... I put that they could sub basically any of the breeds I asked for except the JG with golden sexlinks.

 

[vegaburm]

I ordered from my pet chicken with a hatch date of this Monday and picked up my chicks in town this morning. Had called yesterday to tell them they were coming and I would pick them up, and they called me this morning at 7 am to be sure. They would have brought them to me, but they don't usually get to my place until after lunch. Happy to have my new chicks! Ordered them in November last year!!!! MPC doesn't usually add extra chicks to small orders, just so you know.