They will make you feel better!
Sorry you missed your poultry show.
Reply by Chick Crazed: Chicks are fun, are safer from a disease standpoint, usually end up friendlier and really aren't hard to raise if you educate yourself in advance. Give them enough space, proper temps and fill their feeders and waterers along with keeping an eye out for a couple common maladies and you are good to go.
@wotkuni If you don't get them as chicks, you'll miss what is known as "Chicken TV" (sitting there staring at their antics). They grow really fast; every day you can see changes. Like @ChickCrazed
said, if you handle them from the beginning, they'll be friendlier and it will be easier to give them check-ups if they're used to you. As far as starting with chicks or pullets, feel free to ask as many questions as you can think of and do a lot of research. Chickens are fun!
@Indyshent
Oh my gosh, you have so much going on, and of course your health is the most important issue.
That t-shirt is awesome! All the team's merchandise used to just say "COCKS", which is, of course, why so many juvenile boys in middle and high school loved wearing said merchandise.
Regarding obtaining babies versus adult birds, I've noticed fairly little difference in my ability to easily handle bird later. I've obtained lots of juvenile and adult birds later in life, and some of these birds--despite never being affectionately handled before--were much easier to handle, and some are almost feral. I've had similar experiences with babies. Some babies--no matter how much you handle them and how much they see of you--grow up almost wild and flighty. A lot of a chicken's ability to be tamed is in the breeding, I think. While increased handling can build positive associations and trust (even affection), it's not everything. Some birds are just going to be gentle or mean or flighty, no matter what you do.
I've come to the conclusion that I actually prefer getting adult birds for a variety of reasons.
1. You already know what they're going to look like (size, color, gender, show quality, type, comb type, etc). No heartbreaks if the pullet turns into a rooster, or your Ameraucana turns out to be an EE, your olive eggs hatch into ringneck pheasants, or your "show quality" chicks become a bunch of BYMs. It's much harder to dupe a buyer who can see, inspect and interact with the finished product. A partridge Cochin is almost identical to a dark Brahma. BLR looks a lot like blue partridge. Australorps can look a lot like Jersey Giants. BCM can look a lot like black sexlinks.
2. You already know what the personality is going to be like (broodiness, aggression, protectiveness, disposition, sociability, how it will fit into flock dynamics)
3. Older birds are not likely to be pecked to death. When integrating adults birds, I've never experienced more than minor squabbles as pecking orders get established, However, these squabbles can have disastrous repercussions when it's adult birds against juveniles or babies, which are among God's most fragile creations. In the last week, I've lost two juveniles--not because the adults were even actively trying to kill them--but because they were getting crushed underfoot when adults rushed the feeders or dismounted roosts. I've lost three to drowning, of all the stupidities. The kind of stupid, heedless behavior that will kill juveniles, however, rarely kills adults, who can fend for themselves far better.
4. Older birds are less susceptible to predation. Almost anything can kill a chick, while relatively few will tangle with full-grown roosters (and even fewer will be successful and leave the encounter unscathed). Adults are fiercer combatants and more likely to live through encounters with predators because they can fight, fly, run or all of the above. Some chicken breeds are particularly fierce combatants and have even fended of threats such as hawks, coyotes and dogs. Chicks don't stand a chance against anything.
5. Older birds are typically cheaper, when one considers all of the food, supplies, and time it took the bird to grow up. Quite often, adults can be found for free.
6. Disease poses a major threat to babies. What could be a minor inconvenience or sniffle to an adult can easily kill an infant. Adults have better hygienic practices usually and typically fortified immune systems; chicks have neither. Hatcheries typically vaccinate chicks for some common diseases (like Marek's), but vaccinations do not prevent the bird from carrying the disease (only from expressing the infection in many cases), and--worse yet--hatcheries are often found to be selling or breeding birds which carry highly contagious diseases like MG. As most places don't even test for such diseases, it's still a crapshoot as to whether your supposedly disease-free chick is in fact free of diseases. While free-range adults are likely riddled with diseases and parasites, their robust immune systems are better able to handle the load without symptoms.
7. Almost everyone has been duped at some point or another when the Marans laid lighter eggs than price paid would have suggested, or when the Ameraucana eggs weren't blue, or even when the Cayuga's eggs were gray or white (black-laying Cayugas are really hard to find). When there is 4 months to a year of waiting for that first egg (plus housing, food, other supplies), wouldn't you rather cut to the chase and find out if what you've paid for is actually what you're getting?
Be sure to check out the members' page--the link is in posts by mother2hens, jchny2000, and others. Let one of us know if you want to be added.
But...then again he seems to be enjoying this almost as much as I am so far lol. So what are your favorites?
