Have you ever been to a REALLY bad backyard breeder?

[Eggcellent]

I found some pullets for sale on craigslist locally. They were supposed to be pure bred barred rocks for sale but when I got there it was obvious no birds at all were pure bred, much less pure bred rocks. The chickens were all terrified of people and they couldn't even catch one for me to take a look at. At least half of them had some problems like cross beak or bent toes. Some had even worse defects. It was sad really

I thought about buying a few of the pitiful ones to rescue but I ended up leaving with nothing. After I thought about it, I figured buying them would only encourage these people to breed more birds. Needless to say, I took a head to toe shower and washed my clothes and shoes when I got home.

Has anyone else experienced something like this?

 

[rhoda_bruce]

Oh yes.
An old cajun lady I knew had a 'anything goes' chicken farm. There wasn't a blade of grass on the place, but for the most part I can't say much against her. I know for a fact she loved raising chickens.
And then there is someone else. I won't say much about his background, but he should have a coop to make mine look horrible. Well he doesn't. He loves exotic breeds and game birds and has a large variety of just about every kind of poultry I have ever had in my life. I think I can easily say that the coop should be about 5 times bigger than it is, to allow more room for starts and then maybe he can stop confining his birds in small cages when he wants to breed them. I went there last spring and we had some rain the previous day....there was a dead rooster in the mud. Not good.

 

[suebee]

Yes. They had many breeds of poultry. I walked around with them and they would show me various birds, sometimes they'd pull dead chickens out of the pens. Worst thing was lice crawling all over me when I got home...eeekk!
Never went back.

 

[chickenwhisperer123]

Nope.

Thank God.

Sorry to hear about your experience though. Buying some of those birds could have ruined your flock. You did the right thing.
Maybe you could make an anonymous call to animal control?

 

[sonew123]

yup and it was bad! I wanted to cry-I left with nothing-a craigslist add I traveled 1 1/2 hrs away-Im sure they meant well but just plain ignorant and she was a breeder -I did not want to even helpher breed more so I left-

 

[Guinea Goonie]

Went to a house for sale under auction.....

As I was looking about, I found the "coop" This old man had 75 (as I was told and actually knew the people they went to) White Rocks in a 20 x20 with a roof that had "sun panels" in the structure. Now, sun panels means that "SOME" light comes through. There was NO windows and only a door to the place. HE NEVER LET THEM OUT !!!

The floor was covered in at least 4 inches of chicken poop and the feeders and waterers left were horrid. Unfortunately the poor things did not fair much better and in the end they were all sold or killed by predators. I ended up with about 10 pullets and a roo (babies) from this flock. I still have them in my barn all grown up, happy and laying. The roo is doing good, except he seems to have legs mites which I am treating.

Here is a pic of the roo.

 

[kees]

Quote:
Okay, that's pretty bad.

Suzy

 

[TarzantheChickenMan]

there are two different guys that breed birds near me one has just pristine coops the other has nice birds but some of the breeds just seem to not get the attention that his Prize birds do

 

[Whisper]

Well I wouldn't hold flighty birds alone against someone. Mine are perfectly calm when you're walking up with a handful of scratch, but try to catch them? Hah, let the rodeo begin, they act like they've never seen a human. You'd never guess they were raised in the downstairs bathtub and were pampered pets.

 

[Eggcellent]

Quote:
I know how normal flightiness is, even with some of my own birds... but this was something completely different. These chickens acted almost feral. These folks had chicken scratch, nets and a hook fashioned from a coat hanger and still couldn't catch one. Mind you there were over 140 birds running all around.

The whole scene was surreal... They had a small trailer converted to the coop, which is fine.... but they had like 140 birds in it... Not so fine... The people themselves lived in a camper that was maybe 9x14 or so. It was so weird... In addition to the two people outside of the camper trying to catch the birds, there was an old man yelling directions out to them from inside the camper.

There was a 15x15 garage and the lady opened that up to try to scare some chickens in there. She thought maybe she could catch some if she scared them in or lured them in with feed... The garage was literally floor to ceiling with rabbit cages full of rabbits... There were also tons of rabbits running free.

I did hear some ducks off in the woods but could not see them... She said they were in a run.

They had horses, goats and sheep in what you could crudely call a pasture.... I didn't see any shelter for any of them...

I really didn't know what to say... It was one of the few times in my life I was just speechless.

And chickenwhisperer... Maybe I will make that call to animal control.... The chickens looked like they suffered from bad breeding or incubating more than neglect. At least they had food and shelter... The troubling part is that I didn't see any shelter for the larger animals - not even a lean to.