Hatchery/Breed

[rickson]

I live in Central Illinois and will be ordering our families first chickens here in a few days.

I was going to order some White Rocks and was wondering what other breed would play nice with them.

Also, I was going to get sexed chicks from Murray/McMurray, how good are they at sexing the chicks and what is the chick mortality rate per day?

Thanks!!!!

 

[gritsar]

Most chickens can live quite happily in mixed flocks.
Sexing at all the major hatcheries is 90% accurate at best.

 

[rickson]

Where does everyone get their chicks?

Is there anywhere that does not require you to get 25?

 

[new chick 203]

http://www.mypetchicken.com

 

[gritsar]

Quote:
Several hatcheries now have small order programs. I use Ideal Hatchery. They have a min. dollar amount, not a minimum chick amount.

 

[NewHen]

I ordered my chicks and most of the stuff from mypetchicken.com, only to find that there are a lot of local places that it's much cheaper to get the stuff. For chicks, brooder, feed, etc, try online searching for a local "feed" store or hardware store. Even some regular pet stores here had all the brooder and feed stuff.

 

[clothdiaperingmom]

Ideal poultry in TX. $25 minimum order. Charge a small order fee $7, and quarter box fee $1. Not sure what shipping would be for you in IL. You can order assortments (think straight runs though) and pay less fees.
However, they are out of alot of breeds till May. Better to call then order online as they will give you up to date availability on the phone.

www.idealpoultry.com

I ordered from mypetchicken, but cancelled because they charge $31.95 for shipping. yikes! Im in TX, so ideal charges me nothing for shipping. And found that a feed store in the next larger city closest to me, had all the breeds I was looking for (except silkies) for only $2 a bird, no minimums. So I got my standard chicks from the feed store. (silkies coming from ideal)

Good luck.

 

[Chickiemama1010]

If you live in illinois, and Mcmurray is in illinois, go with it.

Most hatcheries are 90-95% accurate in sexing. Meyer hatchery guarantees up to 90% but they have been quite accurate from my experience. If you are worried about sexing, get sexlinked birds. They wont go broody or hatch eggs on their own, but they are excellent layers and the roos are a different color than the hens, even at birth, so its harder to screw up the sex.

Call or e-mail mcmurray and ask if they have a min order for PICK UP. Most hatcheries wont ship small quantities because the chicks will be DOA due to cold. The ones that will take small mail-orders usually include "packing peanuts' which are essentially a few extra rooster chicks to keep the rest of the babies you REALLY want warm. Some people dont mind the extra roos if they are going to the freezer. MOST people dont want 6 or 7 random rooster chicks to have to raise till they can be identified as roos, and then culled or re-homed or butchered for meat. If you live in an area where you arent allowed roos, this could be even more of a problem for you.

I live in OH. I have Meyer hatchery less than 15mins drive from my home. I ALWAYS pick up. Chicks you can pick up yourself will generaly be more viable and less stressed or dehydrated from getting mailed. Would you like to travel in a dark poop-filled box thru the mail? wouldnt that make you a little cranky and stressed?

I just picked up a dozen little chicks (black australorps) on Tues. morn. There were 7 or 8 other customers there waiting to get their ordered chicks too. We were chatting amongst ourselves, all looking fwd to our babies. There was a man from Pennsylvania, took the day off work to come get his chicks. He drove 6hrs, and had a 12volt heating blanket to plug into his car lighter to keep them from getting chilled on the ride back to PA. I suppose some of the hand-warmer things hunters use would work as well. There were also people from other parts of OH there, that were between a 35min and 2hr drive that came to Pick Up. Someone also came from kentucky (4-5hrs)to pick up some Buckeye pullets and a single roo, because apparently no other hatchery she can find has them. Go figure...getting buckeyes from the buckeye state!

So the point is, you may have to drive an hour or 2 or even 3 to get to McMurray. It will be worth it. Its not unheard of or uncommon for folks to travel a bit to get their chicks. They will be healthier, happier chicks, you wont have to pay shipping charges (at least thats the case at Meyer where I go) and you wont have extra packing peanut roos to deal with. Good luck!

 

[bagendhens]

i just placed an order with healthychicksandmore.com
great customer service so far, they were quick to answer my questions and super fast with schedualing shipping (i wanted delivery the week of the 28th and got my email today stating they are planned to ship out on the 31st of march!

they have a "pick your own" option where you can pick as few as 1 per breed.
its a 10 chick minimum order, (but 10s easier to deal with extras than 15)

they didnt have a huge selection like murray, ideal ect...
but they had all the breeds i wanted in the standards.

pullets were $5 a peice BUT its free shipping so it worked out nicely, it would have been almost $60 to order 5 from Mypetchicken, and im only 1/2 hour up the road from them, they dont allow pick up, and I couldnt find what i wanted locally...for $55 i got 10 chicks 2 of each of the breeds i wanted plus there throwing in a free "mystery" baby...

untill they arrive i cant tell you much about quailty, nor do i know if they throw in "packing peanuts" but ive got my fingers crossed for a safe and happy group of chickies!

 

[BellaLulaFarm]

We ordered from Cackle Hatchery, got 5 varieties, shared the order with 3 other friends/relatives, and got 3 free along with our order of 25. One was DOA, all others did well until we had 2 get sick at 9 days of age (see my other post re: sick chicken disease identification), but they are recovering. I think Cackle had a minimum order of 15. The customer service was excellent, although their attitude toward the sick chickens was "isolate them, give them fresh water, and see if they live". I guess since you could have bought 4 chicks for the price of the antibiotics I got for the 2 sick ones, that's a prosaic view.