How does one buy chicks?

[oldrooster]

This may be posted in the wring place if so please move it. When it comes to buying chicks from a big box farm supply store or a co-op or feed store that has bins or watering troth's full of chicks in the experience of you the reader or second hand of friend/family member does your store allow you to point and say I want the third from the left in the back of the back left corner 2nd from the right front etc.etc.etc. or is it only 3 from this bin 5 from the other bin and so forth. also does the amount of customers mean anything like if there is no one there you can pick and chose or if there are 20 people in line it's thrown out and you just chose the bin and the number of chicks wanted. Why I am asking I was stalking a big box store thinking of buying some chicks it took ALL of my willpower to say no. but while there I noticed a bin of sex link chicks and the sign said it was straight run me not having sex linked chicks before and not owning a "smart" cell phone (I just have a flip phone and web access is at best horrible) helped save me from buying. Why you may ask it helped? I could not remember what meant male or female on markings, if I had owned them in the past I might have remembered what markings to look for and I was not going to buy the minimum number of all males or get 5 of 6 or 7 of 8 males when I could have had a clue on what was there and never purchased from a store ordered chick. I now have a piece of paper in my wallet with the markings wrote on it.

 

[Brahma Chicken5000]

I’ve never bought chicks from big box stores like Tractor Supply Co, I’ve read too many stories of people getting males from the pullet bin, wrong breed chicks, etc. to make me feel comfortable with buying from them. I have ordered chicks from My Pet Chicken twice and I was very pleased.

 

[RodNTN]

Were they red or black sex links? With Black sex link chicks, females are all black, males are all black also, but have a white spot on their head.
With Red sex links, the females are orangish/reddish, while the boys are yellow or white.

At our Co-op and Rural King, we get to hand pick the chicks we want. (And we always pick the healthiest).

 

[chickenmama109]

i got my flock from tracter supple co and i got to pick which onesi wanted and i would say one of the gray ones and if that was not the gray one i wanted im sure you could just say no the one next to that make sure the chicks you get are heathly with nice clear eyes good luck

 

[AlleysChicks]

I lucked out with my first chicks. The guy at the store was scared of chickens and said he’d hold the box if I grabbed them lol the second time I bought bantams and asked if I could pick them out. Easy enough. I personally think it depends on the person. Some are friendly and some will just put whatever they grab in a box.

 

[RodNTN]

Haha! Well put @AlleysChicks

 

[chickenmama109]

I’ve never bought chicks from big box stores like Tractor Supply Co, I’ve read too many stories of people getting males from the pullet bin, wrong breed chicks, etc. to make me feel comfortable with buying from them. I have ordered chicks from My Pet Chicken twice and I was very pleased.

yes i got 12 chicks at tracter supple co that were gonna be female but i got a rooster but i am very glad i got a rooster i am know incubating 5 chicken eggs

 

[oldrooster]

I’ve never bought chicks from big box stores like Tractor Supply Co, I’ve read too many stories of people getting males from the pullet bin, wrong breed chicks, etc. to make me feel comfortable with buying from them. I have ordered chicks from My Pet Chicken twice and I was very pleased.

On the pullet and rooster problem I know hatcheries claim 90-95% accurate on sex and the big box, feed store and co-ops generally get from the big hatcheries so I would not hold them to be 100% accurate either and i understand some accidental mix ups of labeling of chicks or sometimes a chick may be misplaced in a wrong bin (or one clerk may intentionally put the last chick or two of a different looking breed into a different breed's bin to condense them and the next clerk may not know that person a did and be too ignorant to figure it out on their own. I am ignorant of what some chicks on certain breeds are supposed to look like, especially the ones that hatch almost identical in looks as another. but I have an idea on most of what they are supposed to look like and if I get breed a and it looks like bred b I figure I'm partially at fault.

Were they red or black sex links? With Black sex link chicks, females are all black, males are all black also, but have a white spot on their head.
With Red sex links, the females are orangish/reddish, while the boys are yellow or white.

At our Co-op and Rural King, we get to hand pick the chicks we want. (And we always pick the healthiest).

as I said in the opening post I looked it up and figured out what is what and wrote it down so I can be an informed buyer. some of the local big box won't let you touch the chicks even if buying them that is why I asked if most (if not all) allowed to pick and choose out of a bin. That was part of my concern about straight run sex link and not remembering the color codes per say. I didn't want all male, if they had choice that may be what I got out of ignorance if they never hopefully i would be able to say out of 5 i want 3 of this color(s) and 2 of the othr.....

 

[oldrooster]

Also I am happy I educated myself on the sex links i figured the red was like the black you got the identical looking adult (on feathering). but I soon learned that the reason the hatcheries had different names for the red sex links the different parent breeds make different patterns on the adults.

 

[turtlelaura67]

We get ours from the livestock auctions and if they're young and we wind up with a rooster here or there, we deal with it. The big buyers at the auctions take them straight to the slaughterhouse so we're happy to save them from that fate if we can.