Explaining Chicken Math

[BullChick]

Good question. I am worried about Chick Days at TSC. I have to go there for feed. Chick Days is 7 weeks. That means if I go twice, I should only find 15 - 20 chicks that have "mysteriously" gotten into the car.
Ziegenhof, if you mean you are adding walking space above, I agree it counts as space. I was told (in the end everyone has an opinion) that roosts don't count. Then again, neither do laying hens, broody hens, roosters, meat birds, anything named or chicks.

 

[Ziegenhof]

Good question. I am worried about Chick Days at TSC. I have to go there for feed. Chick Days is 7 weeks. That means if I go twice, I should only find 15 - 20 chicks that have "mysteriously" gotten into the car.
Ziegenhof, if you mean you are adding walking space above, I agree it counts as space. I was told (in the end everyone has an opinion) that roosts don't count. Then again, neither do laying hens, broody hens, roosters, meat birds, anything named or chicks.

LOL I hate the mysterious chickens that wind up in the car! I almost came home with a deformed foot Aracuna that was one of two chicks left in their brooder at the feed store... Better half prevailed and I didn't come home with it.

Yeah I'm counting that vertical space, seen plenty of my family that have raised thousands of chickens use less then "what's stated as a min for sq on the ground" . We've just always built multiple roost areas with lots of space and made sure those nesting boxes were down low and not under a roost to keep the poop off it.

 

[chickenmomma16]

I almost went to the poultry auction on Saturday. You better believe a few new chickens would have mysteriously wound up in our coop. "But honey! Mo (our roo) NEEDS more variety in his girls!"

 

[BullChick]

I can't use that. I have ten breeds. I get to use, "but the hatchery was out of everything I wanted when I ordered! I HAVE to get the ones I wanted!"

 

[chickenmomma16]

I think I'm going to use the excuse when my hens go broody "If they are not laying I might as well put them to work doing something" I get about 4 broodies at a time so 12 eggs each that = 48 chicks maybe twice a year so = 96 chicks in one year from 4 hens... Now if I can talk him into getting an incubator... And expanding the coop... I'm really liking chicken math!

 

[Ziegenhof]

I'm being offered a few broody hens from my uncle. I just have no clue what breed they are (one is black looks about wyandotte size) and the other is a silkie crossed with something. I just gotta figure out where to put them because my chicken math is way off with 12 evil, we don't share hens! I really need to get to work on building out new pen!

 

[Arica]

So I am on page twelve but had to post so her it go 6 mont year olds friend gives 5 11 then some die hen go broody predoter down to 7 then after five years the numbers go up high..... I order 6 chicks from MPC one dies at one week old so now I have twelve now today after church I am gettting a free silkie roo named pumpernickel Yikes then if I have a broody next year hopefully I will I have a silkie and salmon favoral chicks I'll have to give them some fertlized eggs

 

[Wrightsx4]

This thread is hilariously relateable!!! In June we decided to "think about" getting a few (3-4) chickens, started fixing up a coop...you know, slowly get it ready. Next day I found a guy two hours away selling 6 week old pullets. So while hubby was at work the kids and I took a roadtrip to "look". Of course he had beautiful birds - aren't they all? We picked out our 3-4 which turned into 6 then he had two barred rocks (the breed my daughter wanted but had no 6wk pullets) that were 12 week olds that he had to get rid of before they reached laying age because their barring didn't meet the standard he wanted for breeding...of course we couldn't leave them. Took home 8 chickens. Husband was surprised, not really. In august I decided it would be a fun family project to build our own incubator over the winter. Two days later I completed it - of course we had to know if it worked! So we ordered hatching eggs from too far away (we were getting eggs from the older girls by then but no rooster =no fertile eggs) Oh, by the way, hubby originally said NO roosters. Didn't want them waking him up. So now he says we need a rooster so we don't need to do that again. The eggs arrived in poor condition with many broken and what we discovered 3 wks later very shook up. Candling showed growth in only 3 eggs and one didn't look good. What if only 1 hatched? It would be so lonely, how would it stay warm all alone? And it certainly wouldn't survive in with the big chickens. So I placed a small order from Meyer. Hubby said yes, three more would work much better. So I got 7. Now 8 since only one did hatch...so I have 16. Instead of 3-4. And two are roosters.

 

[ChickyBangBang]

I've already caught the bug. We agreed on a total of 3 pullets...so I ordered 5 hatching eggs of Swedish Flower Hens. Then, I read on here how shipped eggs don't have a good hatching rate, so I ordered 3 more. Then, I read on here how it's completely random on gender - so I ordered 3 more. After that, I clicked on a picture of a frizzle-feathered chicken and fell in love, so I had to order 6 frizzle gened hatching eggs, too. After that I found out that the frizzle feathers aren't guaranteed since they're bred with a standard to avoid a frazzle. So, to avoid getting zero frizzles I ordered 5 more. Then I saw a silkie for the first time and fell in love with those as well, and ordered three hatching eggs of blue and white ones. So - going from "We are only getting 3 pullets"....we now have 25 hatching eggs on their way to us in the mail.

Let me mention - during this time I'm contacting the breeders left and right asking them to hold off on collecting the eggs because I want to hatch them all around the same time. lol I think one of the breeders is ready to sock me.

I highly doubt out of 25 eggs we'll only have 3 pullets. I have no idea what I'm going to do with all these chicks.

Maybe some of you in Missouri will come take some of them off my hands when they hatch?

 

[BullChick]

I've already caught the bug. We agreed on a total of 3 pullets...so I ordered 5 hatching eggs of Swedish Flower Hens. Then, I read on here how shipped eggs don't have a good hatching rate, so I ordered 3 more. Then, I read on here how it's completely random on gender - so I ordered 3 more. After that, I clicked on a picture of a frizzle-feathered chicken and fell in love, so I had to order 6 frizzle gened hatching eggs, too. After that I found out that the frizzle feathers aren't guaranteed since they're bred with a standard to avoid a frazzle. So, to avoid getting zero frizzles I ordered 5 more. Then I saw a silkie for the first time and fell in love with those as well, and ordered three hatching eggs of blue and white ones. So - going from "We are only getting 3 pullets"....we now have 25 hatching eggs on their way to us in the mail.

Let me mention - during this time I'm contacting the breeders left and right asking them to hold off on collecting the eggs because I want to hatch them all around the same time. lol I think one of the breeders is ready to sock me.

I highly doubt out of 25 eggs we'll only have 3 pullets. I have no idea what I'm going to do with all these chicks.

Maybe some of you in Missouri will come take some of them off my hands when they hatch?

Oh, SURE! Give someone else a bad case of chicken math! ENABLER!