I have poultry fever!

[Drk_Wlf]

Last year I didn't get meat ducks because we thought we would be moving before they would be ready to process. Well its long past the time I wanted to move by and I'm still here, so I'm kicking myself for not getting ducks last year.

Now it's that time of year again. I have received chick catalogs in the mail and chick days at TS are a month away. I don't know if I will be able to resist buying a few ducks and/or bantam chicks this year. We are definitely moving this summer now, but my DH is already moved and it's just me at the house. Someone stop me before my DH comes home for the weekend and finds the brooder set up in the spare bedroom! I mean a few bantam chickens won't be that hard to move.

 

[Domestic_goddess]

I know how you feel. I am so anxious to buy chicks, I think about ordering online and I think well the farm store will have them in month. Do I buy now or wait. Then I ordered a incubator and I can't wait to get that going....it will be first time trying that. I might just get addicited and get myself in trouble. Oh the joys of poultry fever! I have moved short distances with Chickens, it all worked out fine. Depending on how many you have, I hear dog crates are great for the move. I drove 4 hours to deliver a rooster and he did great. Good luck

 

[gryeyes]

I moved 52 miles from the Sacramento area to the Western Sierra foothills with a flock of 50-ish chickens, a goose and four ducks. From the flatlands into the mountains, on a two-lane, winding highway. Oy! They survived, it took over 90 minutes per trip, with poultry in cardboard boxes, not very happy about the twists and turns or the change in altitude. I think they recovered more quickly than did I.

Across a greater distance, just have fruit bits in the carriers with your birds (provide water at every stop). If it's across state lines, uhhhhh... Can't advise on that, but it may take some vet certification.

But I certainly u derstand about poultry addiction! I got it bad, too.

 

[Nitrous]

Poultry fever is not treatable, with aspirin. There is no known cure. Only treatment... which is similar to treating any other addiction. You give the person enough to "get by" but not enough to get any real pleasure out of the experience.

As soon as you see the ducklings or chicks and say the words "Oh! they're so cu-" you are DONE. It becomes hardcore when you get your first egg. Soooo sad. There's no going back then.

 

[Drk_Wlf]

It's an 8 hour drive but it's not over any state lines. It's from one corner of NY state to the other. We have already moved our big animals (goats, sheep, pigs) so comparatively moving a couple chickens should be a piece of cake. Our older layers are going to a farmer friend of ours so we won't have to move them, just the bantams if I end up getting some. I was really kicking myself for not getting any chicks last year, it was the first year since I started raising chickens that I didn't have any chicks or ducklings running about. I'm going through baby animal withdraw!