Am I the only one who gets their hackles up sometimes at feed stores. I know they try to do their best with the animals that sell in the spring but something I just get a little bothered. A couple weeks ago I went to Buchheits. The local supply store. They have 8-10 week old pullets in various breeds. That they said they just got in today. They were $10. Which I found amusing. Because I just went to a huge swap and couldn't sell my 4 month old pullets of the same breeds for $5. They also always have roosters for sell for $20. Hatchery ones. Haha. You can barely give them away. I wish I was the lucky one to sell the roosters to them. Anyway. As I looked over the new pullets. They had about 15 of them crammed into a rubber 50 gallon water tub. Which usually only holds about 20 day old chicks. Then I noticed their food bowls were completely filled up with corn. Thats it. No grit, no crumbles. Just corn. This bothered me quite abit as they were still very young chicks and needed the vitimins and proteins from crumbles. I tracked down several workers and talked to them. I explained that they weren't old enough to eat corn yet. And even if they were it's only a treat. Not a complete food. They also needed some grit. They just laughed. And blew me off. Then went right back to what they were doing. Or they said sorry I don't mess with the chickens I just clean their cages and feed them. Blah blah. I even offered to fill it up for them. But they just went onto saying 'Corn is what chickens eat'. I left feeling very fustrated. I wanted to call and complain or tell the manager or something. But my family who was with me at the time told me it wasn't a big deal and to just forget about it. It bothered me all day. Worrying about the birds not getting the right diet, or not being able to digest it. I know it don't trouble some people. But it did me. They also had three banty hens in there. With only corn, no oyster shell. That had about 10 eggs sitting in there cage. Which tells me it hadn't been cleaned in a while. And no one cared to remove them. How long would it of taken to reach in there and get them out. A few had been stepped on and broken and it was just a mess. There was also a little kid picking up chicks and squeezing them until they were screaming. Then he would get scared and drop them several feet. His mother was right there smiling. 'Oh how cute.' I asked him very kindly to put the chicks down and not touch them again. His mother didn't seem to happy about that. Ugh. How can people so easily buy from them. Such as a rooster for $20. But I can't practicly give away happy healthy hens from breeder flocks. Or why will they not give educated farm people the jobs instead of just the random person from the city. I haven't met one person in there that knows anything about animals. I once called to see what breeds of chicks they got in that day. She told me. 'Chicks. You know the little baby ones.' I asked for the kind. She said 'Oh I think we have some red ones and maybe some black.' Oh well. I just don't understand sometimes. haha. If I had the time I would open up a little supply store. At least I would be able to answer questions, or give advice. Cause truely. Especially in my area. It's mostly old farmers. The know nothing about animals. Except what they learned back in the day. Tons of old rough looking horses and other critters around here, that are just left out in scraggly pastures with junk everywhere, and no shelter, no care for months. Honestly there no breeders or serious animal people around here for miles, for any type of animals. Which is funny. Seeing that I live in prime farm country, out in the middle of no where.
yeah i know what you mean. i quit going to a feed store that is like not even 5 mins away because they sold me MEDICATED chick food for a duck..... you don't feed ducks medicated food because there are medications that can be fatal to ducks. and the feed didn't come in the original bag so i didn't know iw as being sold medicated food. it was in a scooper thing and you scoop out as much as you want. no labels or anything!! sooo needless to say my first duckling i ever had died. i was devistated. i went back again! to get scratch for my ducks once and saw that they were filling up the tubs.. the bag said medicated chick feed. i had to walk out before i went off. soo now i drive about 15 miles to get duckling food. there is ONE store that sells game bird starter feed because i refuse to feed my ducks chick feed. it scares me now. i even got into an arguement with the young like 15 year old girl who was sitting there smacking her gum like a cow over food. i wonder how many ducks they have killed. i drive 10 miles to get layer pellets for my adults because i absolutely refuse to go to the feed store that is not even 5 mins away from my house.
Contact the local Animal Control and explain the situation. I'll bet a visit from the authorities will encourage them to take proper care of their birds.
We are blessed that both of our local feedstores are fabulous. Knowledgeable workers, good quality chicks and products. The only giggle I got this year was when we got to the feedstore bright and early to pick up chicks. DD and I were the only ones there so it was pretty laid back. We were helping the clerk open the cases and count the chicks and seperate them into ig tubs. This was thier first year doing chicks so she was a bit nervous. She raises meat birds...hundred of meat birds every year so layers arent her speciality. All was going well til we got to the last box. She opens it up and quick puts the top back on with a stricken look on her face. I start imagining that there is a box of dead chicks in her hand. I say 'Oh No. Whats the matter' She looks up at me as she slides the top off the box so I can see and says 'They mixed up a whole bunch of different ones in this box.' I took a moment to compose myself all the while praying DD doesnt bust out laughing or say something silly...Finally when I dont think that I will choke, I explain that those are Easter Eggers...they are supposed to look different... Of course after that you know I had to buy 6 of those mixed up chicks... Part 2 of that funny story was when I wanted to buy 6 of those EE's, 4 BO and 4 SS. She told me I had to buy them in lots of 6 or more. Hmmm. 6 + 4 + 4 = 14 in my math. It took a few go rounds but I finally convinced her that the 'law' was 6 minimum in any one purchase. I could buy 1 of each kind as long as I bought at least 6 kinds. Poor thing. Next year will be better for her!
I have mixed feelings about our local feed store They tried to sell me weight management dog food because they were out of senior and I had to explain that it was for an underweight elderly Great Dane. "Lotsa old dogs is fat," he said. "No, MY dog is about 20 pounds underweight." "Then ya needs to feed her more." Luckily, they do not get chicks in the spring as there used to be a hatchery in the small town north of there and they still haven't bothered. I would start boycotting the store, stop shopping there and tell friends and others to do the same. Luckily in my area, there are about 6 stores, incl. a few TSC stores and our TSC stores have good employees.
Wow, I guess I'm really lucky with the store near me. I went there over the weekend, and they had about 7 types, including Silver laced wyandotte, EE, and a tray of roo's. There was only about 5-12 chicks per tray, and they were definitely only 1-3 days old, in their own room of the store with two grown men in overalls sitting in the room watching everyone who came and went. Now, I also went to some other, much much smaller "feed stores", and their chicks weren't as young or kept in as nice of conditions. Small cages, cages on the floor, that sort of thing. But nothing that made me cock an eyebrow or gasp or anything like that. What kind of store keeps their chicks in storage tubs???
This is the reason I won't buy from just any old feed store. I always buy from a family owned and operated one. And I want to know that YOU know what you're talking about before I buy from you, so I'll purposly ask dumb questions. I hope you have better ACO where you are than we do. People chain up their dogs in the front yard on 2 foot of chain with no shade and no water (I'm in S. FL, it was 103 today) and when you call animal control they siply say "Well, why don't you go give it some water?". I don't even bother to deal with any kind of law enforcement anymore. When the time comes the goverment will be paying for me to deal with my anger management issues because I'll be going to jail for hitting some deluvery driver with my car after he finishes bragging about how many animals he hit on the road that week.
Since we moved, we had to use a different feed store. I went in there and looked at the chicks and pulled three out that had HORRID pasty butt. I handed them to the guy behind the counter and informed him how to clean them up and that they will die if you don't. Didn't go back there this week, either!!!!
Oh my gosh. Where is this? I'd consider calling the animal control dept.. Our farm and feed stores are populated with people who live on farms! They are all weathered, just right. Ooooh, that makes me angry.
As a matter of fact I don't buy my feed from them. It's not a good feed. I buy from a local little lady that has great MFA feed. For a lot cheaper. Give the locals business. But for animal supplies, fencing, lumber, anything farm related they are the only store around for probably a 100 or so miles. Well there is two. Each are a half an hour away. Same store. Deal the same. I really don't mind the store. Nice people. Their knowledge about animals is just close to nothing. We go there to pick up building supplies, horse items stuff like that. Being me though, I always like to look over the animals in there. I buy some pullets every year and resell them later on. But this year it was a waste. I paid $3 a bird. And sold them for $5 3 months later. Not much market. I don't know why. Funny thing is I sold all the rooster for $5. Anyway. They aren't purposely hurting animals or misfeeding them. They just really don't know. If I go back and see it again. I will demand to speak with a manager. There is really not much laws with animals around here. No one cares. People can chain dogs without food. Abandon horses. There are no nice barns, or pretty coops. It's country life and it's 'not a big deal' around here. To most people anyway. It sure bothers me. Of course that could be why I had 19 rescued stay cats in the last couple years. Plus a dog, a frost bite goat, a horse, rabbits, squirrels... I'm such a softie. But I don't mind.
