I don't blame you in the least. THEY screwed up and should have AT LEAST covered the cost of shipping the wrong "item". The vet bills? well, I don't know since a lot of people do their own "doctoring" for worms and such. I've been lucky to not have issues but then I am a "only got chicks once" owner so I have no experience.
Do you have any leads on blue Breda pullets? It is tough being in love with an extremely rare breed and a specific color at that.
HI, thx for your interest. My practice is always to take fecal samples to the vet for testing whenever I get new birds. In my experience about 1/3 of every juvenile shipment I've received from private breeders had evidence of worms - some had cocci. The vet bills on the Breda were for a bird that arrived ill and vet had to put down the other companion bird because of illness that incubated before we received shipment - but that's the risk customers take. Most hatcheries/breeders will reimburse birds that expire in the first 24-48 hours but there's a huge risk about conditions or illnesses that are contracted prior and don't manifest until 48 hours or more after receiving shipment. We wound up with no birds in the end after placing our initial order over 7 months ago. At least the Breda boy has a good forever home with friends after all the vet bills and medicines we spent.
There are 3 more breeders I contacted growing out juveniles but too young to sex yet. Out of 3 breeders hopefully there will be a Blue girl somewhere for us. Cuckoos would be a good color for free ranging but my DH liked the Blue after seeing all the varieties. I don't see Bredas thriving too well in snowy conditions but for our SoCal climate where dampness is not an issue Breda should do very well. Our feather-footed Silkies do well in our climate. I was waffling between Breda, Pavlovskaja, or SFH as a gentle non-combative breed for the backyard and after having exprienced the Breda boy we're sold on the friendly, outgoing, curious, unafraid, calm nature of the breed. They do tend to spook jumping straight up from shadows or noises but very instantly regain their composure.
I would prefer not having feather-footed breeds. But curiously I found the breeds most non-combative were either feather-footed, crested, bearded, muffed, tufted, vulture-hocked, 5-toed, pea/rose/walnut combed, or not-combed. In our experience we found the dual-purpose, egg-layers, or straight-combed breeds much more assertive to downright aggressive for our small backyard and we prefer a peaceful flock over having colorful, jumbo-sized eggs.
