Getting new chicks without knowing if male or female

[rainnotebook]

Okay... I'm sorry I keep posting questions but you guys are so helpful!! I've pretty much decided on the chickens I want and I was planning on order them through www.idealpoultry.com However every single breed I've picked is only available through the St Run option, so I won't know if I'm getting a hen or rooster.

I'm concerned about this because I only want one of them to be a rooster and the rest hens. If I get more then one rooster what do I do? I was going to start with 10 chicks and they said to expect 50/50 so if I get 4 or 5 roosters thats not good. Has anyone had this problem and what do they do to solve it? I guess that is a possible problem if my hens eventually hatch their own babies. What do you guys do? I know one local chicken raiser that turns the roosters out if they start fighting. So the roosters hang out until they get eaten, sometimes staying around for awhile.

I'm open to another place to purchase chicks and know for a fact what I'll be getting. I looked at mypetchicken.com but the price to pick the sex for just for one bird was nearly triple what idealpoultry was. Just hoping there is another solution.

Thanks!
Deborah

 

[chickn]

if i were you, i would take your list of breeds you want and check with every hatchery to see if you can get only what you want, i would never order straight run again. hatcheries you might not have thought of
mt healthy , mcmurray
good luck

 

[Iowa Roo Mom]

Check here

 

[NoseyChickens]

I would check locally for started pullets too. In some areas it can be really hard to rehome a rooster if you're not interested in eating it! Craigslist can be helpful too. Good Luck!

 

[Wildsky]

Quote:
McMurray has a min order of 25 chicks, once I saw that I went shopping some place else (Ideal)

If you can't find the chicks you want sexed, you'll have to either skip em or decide to cull if you get to many roosters.

 

[rainnotebook]

Quote:
McMurray has a min order of 25 chicks, once I saw that I went shopping some place else (Ideal)

If you can't find the chicks you want sexed, you'll have to either skip em or decide to cull if you get to many roosters.

And majority of what I wanted was straight run anyhow. I never thought of eating them... hmmm

So what does cull me? (sorry I'm new at this)

 

[rainnotebook]

I'm beginning to think I should pick the breed chicken of the ones that I can get it as a pullet. Would seem the more responsible thing to do.

 

[usschicago1]

Kill
Eather kill to eat
Or Kill to get ride of
TO kill to eat i would look at the butchering threads on this site
To Kill to get ride of ( And this is how i just recently did it) is to kit is on the head (or agaist something) and then drown it. This way it gets knocked out and doesnt feel anything and it dies in the cold water quickly.
Someone correct me if im wrong.
But its easy to get ride of rooster that way

 

[rainnotebook]

Would it be a bad idea to let the roosters grow up together and hope they'll get along... if they don't then I can try to give them away?

My mother in law has chickens and my 80 sq ft run would be bigger then hers and she has several roosters in with each other. They seem to get along fine.

 

[Eggs4Sale]

Be warned, straight run doesn't even guarantee 50/50. Hatcheries have more requests for females, so after they sex 100 of them, pull out the 50 girls, the rest of the boys get thrown back in. So when you ask for straight run, aren't they drawing from a group that has already had lots of females pulled out?

My straight run was 80% roosters.