Help a mailman out: undeliverable mail-order ducklings!

[Kamereone]

Tried posting more last night but this website and my phone dont seem to get along, though it seems to remember what I was trying to type last night:

They've since been upgraded to a big tote and a meat thermometer - there was panic for a minute when I pointed out it needs to be an incandescent bulb! It took a few hours for them to defrost into ten individual chicks, but everyone is eating drinking and eliminating and cheepcheepcheeping happily along as they frolic and make an absolute mess of their quarters. Apple and romaine lettuce were a hit, topped off with a sprinkling of raisin bran crumbs in their water to encourage them to drink up. Yolks and grapes on the menu.

EDIT: Removed the nine miles of blank space and fixed the out-of-order words that my phone was so kind to add.

 

[Kamereone]

Morning update:

One tired out duck pile!

EDIT: Removed the phone garble so it made sense

 

[3KillerBs]

The reason that chicks and ducklings can be sent through the mail is that they absorb the egg yolk just before they hatch and do not actually need to eat or drink for about 3 days after hatching.

They now need feed and water.

If put into the mail again now they will die of starvation and dehydration.

 

[SourRoses]

Please try calling the hatchery that sent them before returning to sender, as they will likely authorize you to rehome the birds rather than send back a box of dead babies.

If I were working in the PO, and rules forced me to send the box back, it would have developed "damage" resulting in a torn looking hole the birds just fell out of. Oops!

Thank you for your efforts to take care of these chicks. It's rare to find someone who cares, mailmen who do are worth their weight in gold. I'm thinking of ours, Larry, who has really gone the extra mile to help us out many times.

 

[Kamereone]

Good news: They most definitely are NOT going back in the mail. Hoorah!

Here's the scoop on the official rules regarding live chicks in the mail:

The rule is 72 hours; if/when it is determined that they can't be a) delivered or b) returned to sender within that time limit, they "must be disposed of immediately"

Stay with me a minute, it's not what it sounds like! "Dispose" in the mail room doesn't mean just throw it out! There's a whole process where all mail that can't be delivered (including our chick friends) is cataloged, opened, inspected and reviewed. Any items that can be reused for business purposes are reused; anything else is donated, recycled or very last resort, disposed of. For perishable items, including live animals, this happens as soon the delivery window has passed or when there is concern about the viability of the contents.

In short, wayward chicks are not just left on a shelf to die; Post Office regulations specifically require real live humans to intervene, and, barring the reintroduction of avian powered air mail delivery, any foundlings will end up going to a good place.

 

[Kamereone]

The reason that chicks and ducklings can be sent through the mail is that they absorb the egg yolk just before they hatch and do not actually need to eat or drink for about 3 days after hatching.

I suspected as much, though it's certainly longer than 72 hours from egg to door, since I can't imagine they go in a box until after they're up and fluffed. Plus, a straight run mixed lot like this one wouldn't get packed until after all the sexed orders were picked. This packing slip claims they hatched at 7am Monday, and the shipping label wasn't generated until around10:30PM.

There was a small dixie cup of what must have been something very (very!) green in the box with them. Thinking it might have been a sort of mash for them to nibble; it was long gone by the time clerks took a peek at them Wednesday morning, and once given fresh water and feed that evening they certainly scarfed it down.

Plus, one does have to wonder... what happens to all the chicks that hatch over the weekend??

 

[Kamereone]

The reason that chicks and ducklings can be sent through the mail is that they absorb the egg yolk just before they hatch and do not actually need to eat or drink for about 3 days after hatching.

They now need feed and water.

If put into the mail again now they will die of starvation and dehydration.

It's worth noting that you can actually mail older birds, it's just a lot more hoops and extra fees (not to mention a bigger box!). Day-olds have been classified separately for about a century; it's only an extra $0.40 to mail them!

(Had a crate with at least one rooster come through a few months ago; the morning sort crew was going mad with all the crowing and were flabbergasted when they all "magically" got quiet once under a blanket!)

 

[Ridgerunner]

I suspected as much, though it's certainly longer than 72 hours from egg to door, since I can't imagine they go in a box until after they're up and fluffed.

A couple of years back a postmaster came on the forum and gave what he said were the rules on mailing baby chickens. A normal baby chicken (and other poultry) absorbs the yolk before it hatches and it should be able to live at least 72 hours on that yolk without having eat or drink. At least 72 hours. That way a chick that hatches early can hang around in the nest with Mama while the later ones hatch.

The chicks are supposed to be shipped within 24 hours of them hatching. They don't all hatch at exactly the same time but the chicks have to be sorted, boxed up, and at the shipping location within that 24 hour window. That's tens of thousands of chicks per hatchery, often twice a week. Those people have to be hustling. Probably overnight to meet an early morning shipping deadline.

The chicks are supposed to have a reasonable expectation of being delivered within 48 hours of shipping. That often includes flying across the country, trucking, and sorting at different locations. That's a huge logistics nightmare for trucking companies, airlines, and the post office. And there are additional rules. For example, the airline cannot ship baby chicks if there is dry ice in the cargo hold, because that may suffocate them as it thaws.

Delivery usually means the post office receives the chicks and calls for somebody to come get them. The phone number is supposed to be on a label.

All it takes is for one weather event, mechanical problem, or person to make a mistake to mess this up. Maybe the person at the hatchery mistypes a label, a storm grounds airplanes or ties up traffic, or a package gets sorted incorrectly. To me the post office and their contractors do an amazing job.

This packing slip claims they hatched at 7am Monday, and the shipping label wasn't generated until around10:30PM.

That shipping label starts that 72 hour clock, 24 hours to get them shipped and another 48 hours to get them delivered.

Plus, one does have to wonder... what happens to all the chicks that hatch over the weekend??

They do not hatch over the weekend. That is carefully timed so they hatch when they need to hatch. Some will still hatch outside that window. Those will not live. That does not mean that they are going to be brutally inhumanely killed, many hatcheries have gotten better about that process the last few years, but they will die. Often the bodies are used, they are not just sent to a landfill.

Good news: They most definitely are NOT going back in the mail. Hoorah!

Here's the scoop on the official rules regarding live chicks in the mail:

The rule is 72 hours; if/when it is determined that they can't be a) delivered or b) returned to sender within that time limit, they "must be disposed of immediately"

Stay with me a minute, it's not what it sounds like! "Dispose" in the mail room doesn't mean just throw it out! There's a whole process where all mail that can't be delivered (including our chick friends) is cataloged, opened, inspected and reviewed. Any items that can be reused for business purposes are reused; anything else is donated, recycled or very last resort, disposed of. For perishable items, including live animals, this happens as soon the delivery window has passed or when there is concern about the viability of the contents.

In short, wayward chicks are not just left on a shelf to die; Post Office regulations specifically require real live humans to intervene, and, barring the reintroduction of avian powered air mail delivery, any foundlings will end up going to a good place.

I did not know most of this and my brother was a rural mail carrier until he retired. Thanks for posting.

 

[3KillerBs]

Plus, one does have to wonder... what happens to all the chicks that hatch over the weekend??

Hatching chicks is remarkably predictable.

Even eggs from a mixed backyard flock in a home incubator will *usually* hatch within a short window centered on 21 days from the time of setting. The hatcheries have it scienced out to hatch as precisely as possible within the needed window.

 

[Kamereone]

From what you've all chimed in with, and from reading some of the threads, it feels like there's a lot of distrust of and often outright vilification of postal workers when it comes to chicks. (Thank you @Ridgerunner for the appreciation of the miracle that is the mail system!)

The mere fact that it's commercially viable for hatcheries to stuff a half dozen unwrapped Twinkies and an open pudding cup in a box riddled with holes and mail it cross-country and expect it to get there in two days ought to be proof enough that something is being done right.

Any suspicion of heartless protocol following robots couldn't be further from the truth. The person you might talk to at the counter might be an absolute grump or totally clueless (they have been sorting mail since 2am, cut them some slack!) but you wouldn't believe the scene caused when there are chicks in the mailroom. Everyone has to coo over them and check in on them. One lies down for a nap or is a little more sluggish than the others, and panic breaks out.

And these guys? It got to the point that last night there was actually a serious discussion of setting up a webcam feed so everyone could check in on how they were doing! Hourly text message photo updates, they've all got names, and one has already been appointed Duck Master General.

Long story short, your mail carrier cares. The clerks who sort your mail care. The postmasters care and even the paper pushers who write the manual care. And even if someone didn't care, no one wants something dead in their truck/office/workplace.

Maybe it might be helpful and ease / prevent future concerns if there was a pinned writeup that outlines what the process is? Not sure if you guys do that sort of thing or have a 'wiki' for resources, but we can certainly contribute some insight into what goes on for the final leg of the journey when chicks get to a city post office.


As for these chicks, there's currently a few good options lined up, though at this point there's some in favor of keeping them around for morale Thank you for everyone who chimed in to offer help and advice.