Hatchery Poll

[Acre4Me]

That's a great idea! Thanks for the info on the hatcheries, as well. I will be using USPS so the shipping issues are concerning. I will tag people to hopefully get updates on health.

YW! You can also private message posters too, the envelope icon on top. But, by tagging them in a thread, they may respond, and others can benefit from their responses.

In my response, meant to say I ordered from a small hatchery NOT on your list. Also, not quite 1 year into my chicken adventure, so I don’t have chicken longevity advice.

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

I have used My Pet Chicken exclusively since 2008. Most of my 90 plus chickens came from them. They have a great website, great customer service, and nice birds. They share space and birds with Meyers hatchery. They are different but the same.

 

[Shorty22366]

I have ordered from My pet chicken with great results with live chicks and sexing.
I ordered from Ideal and 11 out of 15 were males. I will next order from them again.
I have 15 coming from Meyer's on June 3. Ordered from them because of 100% sexing guarantee and have up to 22 weeks to let them know of wrong sexing. I will let you know how this goes.

 

[Kacey Elle]

I have used My Pet Chicken exclusively since 2008. Most of my 90 plus chickens came from them. They have a great website, great customer service, and nice birds. They share space and birds with Meyers hatchery. They are different but the same.

I have ordered from My pet chicken with great results with live chicks and sexing.
I ordered from Ideal and 11 out of 15 were males. I will next order from them again.
I have 15 coming from Meyer's on June 3. Ordered from them because of 100% sexing guarantee and have up to 22 weeks to let them know of wrong sexing. I will let you know how this goes.

Thank you both for suggesting a new place. I think I read a book put out by My Pet Chicken when I first started my adventure in chickens a few years back. I didn't realize they also sold chicks.

@oldhenlikesdogs Can you tell me how they are related to Meyers? Why would it be better to buy from My Pet Chicken vs. Meyers? Or is there a difference?

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

Thank you both for suggesting a new place. I think I read a book put out by My Pet Chicken when I first started my adventure in chickens a few years back. I didn't realize they also sold chicks.

@oldhenlikesdogs Can you tell me how they are related to Meyers? Why would it be better to buy from My Pet Chicken vs. Meyers? Or is there a difference?

Well from my understanding they share warehouse space, and MPC rents incubator space. I'm not totally sure of the whole story. I do know they were the first to do small orders. MPC is based in Connecticut, and chicks ship out of Ohio. Hatching eggs are from all over.

I personally prefer MPC website, and use of that website. The customer service is very nice too. They have always been nice and helpful. I personally have never gotten an incorrectly sexed chick.

I do believe their shipping is higher for smaller orders and it may be overall, I haven't checked. I guess I can't totally tell the difference between MPC and other places because I never used anywhere else except Murray McMurray about 30 years ago.

So maybe fill your cart at MPC and than at Meyers and see if there's a difference. I personally don't mind paying a bit extra to have great customer service.

 

[Kacey Elle]

Well from my understanding they share warehouse space, and MPC rents incubator space. I'm not totally sure of the whole story. I do know they were the first to do small orders. MPC is based in Connecticut, and chicks ship out of Ohio. Hatching eggs are from all over.

I personally prefer MPC website, and use of that website. The customer service is very nice too. They have always been nice and helpful. I personally have never gotten an incorrectly sexed chick.

I do believe their shipping is higher for smaller orders and it may be overall, I haven't checked. I guess I can't totally tell the difference between MPC and other places because I never used anywhere else except Murray McMurray about 30 years ago.

So maybe fill your cart at MPC and than at Meyers and see if there's a difference. I personally don't mind paying a bit extra to have great customer service.

Hmm. Okay, that makes sense. The fact that you've never gotten an incorrectly sexed chick is huge for me since my city doesn't allow roosters and if we got one it would skew our school's fundraising since we'd be down a laying hen (or more than one).

 

[Kacey Elle]

Tagging people who mentioned buying from hatcheries--please weigh in with short and long term health of chicks that you've gotten!

@ChooksNQuilts @WhoDatChick @Farmgirl1878 @paintedChix @DobieLover @N F C @HuffleClaw

 

[paintedChix]

Our first chickens came from TSC - but I don't know which hatchery they were in. Easy to care for PRs, EEs & Cuckoo Marans. Most of these lived for 4-5 years - coming from our other property to this one. Then I had some major losses - 1st during an ice storm when the girls refused to go into their much smaller coop (what do you mean we can't still be in the barn with the rafters up 14- 21' in the air?). I walked out the next morning in shock to find them packed onto 2 outdoor roosts after they'd gotten out of the coop - frozen solid! and then when a couple of starving hunting dogs dug under our pasture fence and took out a total of 22 chickens - 1/2 of which were to go to OUR freezer camp in 2 days.

2015 & part of 2016 - were very bad years. All hatchery chicks (mostly from Privett, but also from Cackle and ??) - most seemed to be un-thrifty and quite a number died in the first couple of weeks - different times of the year (I used different brooders/waters for some of them, don't think it was my brooder crates specifically). They appeared healthy - were eating and drinking, but not really gaining weight/growing and then would just lay down and die. It was awful - Marans, SLW & Ameraucana. Others - our ponies went thru a phase where they would dig holes at the corners of the tractors, become permanent coop. Then the chickens would get out - sometimes never to be seen again.

2018 seems to be our better year - however, my breeder chicks (more expensive than hatchery chicks) have attracted predators that seem to favor CLB and RB PULLETs. Quite frustrating - always during the day and when I'm at work. The hatchery chicks from Privett did great this year - got Australorps (blue variety). I have however, been told by those on the Australorp thread that these aren't Australorps...

Not a lot of help, I don't think...

 

[Farmgirl1878]

I got my first batch of eight chicks from TSC in mid-April of 2018 and my second batch of ten from Meyer Hatchery in mid-July 2018. We rehomed the cockerel from the first batch and as far as I know, he’s getting along great and will be shown at the county fair this summer. Two of the chicks from MH were dead within days for no apparent reason. (And FYI, their customer service was amazing - and very compassionate.) My remaining fifteen are all healthy, laying, and well adjusted.

Truthfully, I don’t see a huge difference in the health or quality between the two groups. (Other than the initial deaths of the two hatchery birds.) Both groups had a couple of chicks with pasty butt, but so far I’ve been very lucky. None of the birds are show quality, except the big SLW cockerel I rehomed and the BLRW cockerel I purchased from MH (go figure, it’s always the two cockerels!). Don’t get me wrong, the faults are all minor - comb shape, foot coloring, feather patterns - nothing that effects the health of the bird.

In terms of sexing, TSC had no idea what breed, let alone what gender my chicks were! The bins were labels incorrectly and the young man who helped me, was clueless about who was which breed (as was I!). No big deal for “practice chicks,” right? The MH chicks were all correctly sexed.

I guess it depends on whether or not people want specific breeds (which I did) that don’t often show up at the feed store and whether or not people want show-quality stock for breeding. I just wanted pet quality breakfast poopers and I got that from both sources.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

Hatcheries will throw in extras to your order. This is a means to get rid of unwanted males. It doesn't matter how accurate they are sexing if they toss some in anyway. You must tell them specifically you don't want "extras".

The hatchery that is closest to you is your best bet for shipping birds. Even better is to go to your local farm store and pick out healthy chicks. Excepting TSC which has a long history of mixing bins, mislabeling and the like resulting in high rate of cockerels in peoples layer chicks feed stores are an excellent place to get your birds. You see the healthy bird and drive it home in short time.

If you talk to a manager at your local feed store they will tack on your order, so if you're looking for many breeds you can special order them when the feed store places it's order. Save on shipping and won't get the extra cockerels thrown in that way. Now is the time to chat with local feed store for spring orders. They will use a hatchery close to you and simply add your order to theirs.