Backyard chicken community- I need your opinion!

[Michael OShay]

Could you buy them back at what she paid you for them, minus the cost of a dozen fertile eggs?

That sounds like a pretty good solution. )

 

[KIWI CHICK]

Thank you

 

[enola]

That is the exact reason that my roosters are only in the breeding pens. I do not sell hens that will be laying eggs that are fertile. I also do not sell fertile eggs for eating.

I had a customer hatch eggs from my laying flock that had game roosters running with the hens. She informed me that she hatched chicks that were the ugliest mongrel chicks she had ever seen! Ha! The joke is on her if she thought she was getting purebred chickens........

 

[Michael OShay]

Thank you

You're welcome.

 

[donrae]

I agree on the price minus hatching eggs, great idea. Normally, no, I wouldn't take birds back. I'm very up front about them, and really try to emphasize they need several days minimum to settle in.

I did have a lady call me in a panic, 7am after purchasing the hen the night before. She bought one bird, as a companion to her sole surviving bird. She called me saying the hen was a psycho demon, it was screaming and running all over the place. I did take that bird back and refund her money, mostly out of pity for the poor hen. But otherwise, not so much. The buyer can stick an add on CL just as easy as I can.

 

[Chickerdoodle13]

For biosecurity reasons, a lot of people opt not to buy back birds. My feeling on it (and what I've done a few times after learning the hard way) is to tell people that I will always take the birds back, but I could not refund the money. That worked very well in most situations, and it was an option most people liked. It was a little bit of an inconvenience for me, minus having to deal with refunds, so it wasn't too bad.

I think if you explain to her that you changed your mind about buying the birds back and your reasoning, it would be fine. She may not be happy, but you don't want her as a customer anyway!

Or you could just cut your losses and take them back just to be done with her. Sometimes the path of least resistance, though hard to swallow, may work just fine with less conflict.

 

[lazy gardener]

After dealing with one season of supplying chicks to friends, I have come to the conclusion that once a bird leaves my property, it will not be coming back. I made a promise to one gentleman that if he ended up with roosters, I'd take them off his hands. He in fact ended up with 2 roosters, and I told him what day I was butchering, and he could bring them that day. A week later, he again asked me to take them back. I had told him that due to biosecurity, I would not take them back unless they were going immediately into my freezer. Not wanting to butcher again, I found a family who could use the meat. They drove to the friend's house, picked up his 2 roos, came to my house, picked up a problem hen... problem solved. I had an other friend call me in a panic asking me to take one of my birds back who turned out to be a roo, as well as several other roos she ended up with. No thanks. The one bird that did return to my flock, came back as a 3 week old chick, and it has worked out well for me and him, as he's a very nice roo, and has good blood lines for my future plans... and I knew the flock situation he was coming from... he actually was still in an inside brooder. In the future, once a bird leaves, it's not coming back.

 

[Folly's place]

I never take birds back, because of my concern about biosecurity. Mary

 

[donrae]

I like the idea of taking cockerels back only on butcher day, and being up front about the bird's fate. I could see doing that at some point, depending again on the situation and how well I knew the other party.

 

[aart]

Tell her you'll buy the hens back only if they come with the chicks that hatched from the hens eggs ;-)

She's probably going to be a 'word of mouth' problem no matter what you do....hopefully the folks that matter(possible future customers) will have her number, or be able to think for themselves, and it won't effect your reputation.

I would definitely be concerned about the bio security of my flock...and re-integrating.