Just a whine, lol, the perils of "straight run"

[Whisper]

Well, last fall we bought nine chicks and Ideal rounded them out with five "packing peanuts" which ate like greedy guts, grew into huge bullies, and became terrors before we rehomed them.

I had the bright idea this time to buy some straight run bantams of a pretty breed, hopefully get reasonably even numbers of males to females, and sell them later as a flock or pairs. So I added six White Faced Black Spanish chicks to my order.

Sigh. Shoulda known . . .

Fast forwards six weeks. ONE little pullet, FIVE little roos, all with big red combs and wattles and white earlobes already, trying to crow and strut and mount everyone else.

The upside is that they'll probably be pretty birds once they're out of this adolescent ugly stage. The downside, well, they're already trying to crow, I need to pick the finest of them and rehome the other four before I have a barnyard symphony in my backyard!

LOL, just my luck. Straight run, sheesh, you'd think these were Chinese chickens, only wanting sons!

 

[Soph xo]

darn it

that sucks!
it's lovely you are going to rehome them rather than cull them

 

[jezzy_54849]

This is off the subject but.......Suburban stealth farming. "What, no, that's not a chicken, it's a . . . look! The Johnsons down the street just put in a tacky fountain! Go get them!" now thats funny!!

 

[pdsavage]

Quote:
Rehoming them is culling also...
Culling is the process of removing animals from a group based on specific criteria. This is done in order to either reinforce certain desirable characteristics or to remove certain undesirable characteristics from the group.

 

[Ridgerunner]

A 5-roo 1-pullet split is not as unusual as you might think, almost a 1 in 10 chance. I once got 7 pullets out of 7 straight run chicks, less than a 1% chance. These splits do happen. And since yours are bantam, you know the hatchery did not stack the odds against you. Just bad luck.

6 chicks

6 male 0 female - 1 in 64 or 1.6%
5 male 1 female - 6 in 64 or 9.4%
4 male 2 female - 15 in 64 or 23.4%
3 male 3 female - 20 in 64 or 31.3%
2 male 4 female - 15 in 64 or 23.4%
1 male 5 female - 6 in 64 or 9.4%
0 male 6 female - 1 in 64 or 1.6%

I'm waiting to see the split on my latest hatch of 17. It is starting to look way roo heavy, which is great for me since most are headed to feeezer camp.

 

[Sesame]

I'm kind of curious about ordering straight run from a hatchery. I have an order in but I'm strongly considering cancelling. If they can sex the chickens at a day old, enough that they can add male chicks as packing material, what is the likelihood that a straight run order isn't going to be predominantly male considering they are the hardest to get rid of?

 

[Ridgerunner]

Quote:
It purely depends on the ethics of the hatchery. I believe most hatcheries are ethical in this regard. As I said, I got 7 pullets out of 7 straight run chicks of one breed. I got 2 pullets out of 6 straight run chicks in another breed. Regardless of all the people that claim the hatcheries stack the roosters in the straight run, I think it is just a matter of the odds. For me to get 7 out of 7 pullets, the odds say someone somewhere is going to get 7 out of 7 roosters and they will be convinced the hatchery is unethical.

You have to pay extra, but most hatcheries will ship sexed pullets. Vent sexing chicks is difficult. The professionals get it right about 90% of the time on full sized breeds but don't even try on the tiny bantams. Out of 15 that were supposed to be pullets, I got 1 roo and 14 pullets. If you are that concerned about it and you have ordered full sized breeds, you can cancell your order and reorder pullets, or maybe change your order if they will let you do that. I don't know how many you have ordered. I'll post some more odds to maybe help you decide which to do.

1 chick

1 male 0 female - 1 in 2 or 50%
0 male 1 female - 1 in 2 or 50%

2 chicks

2 male 0 female - 1 in 4 or 25%
1 male 1 female - 2 in 4 or 50%
0 male 2 female - 1 in 4 or 25%


3 chicks

3 male 0 female - 1 in 8 or 12.5%
2 male 1 female - 3 in 8 or 37.5%
1 male 2 female - 3 in 8 or 37.5%
0 male 3 female - 1 in 8 or 12.5%

4 chicks

4 male 0 female - 1 in 16 or 6.3%
3 male 1 female - 4 in 16 or 25.0%
2 male 2 female - 6 in 16 or 37.5%
1 male 3 female - 4 in 16 or 25%
0 male 4 female - 1 in 16 or 6.3%


5 chicks

5 male 0 female - 1 in 32 or 3.1%
4 male 1 female - 5 in 16 or 15.6%
3 male 2 female - 10 in 16 or 31.3%
2 male 3 female - 10 in 16 or 31.3%
1 male 4 female - 5 in 16 or 15.6%
0 male 5 female - 1 in 16 or 3.1%


6 chicks

6 male 0 female - 1 in 64 or 1.6%
5 male 1 female - 6 in 64 or 9.4%
4 male 2 female - 15 in 64 or 23.4%
3 male 3 female - 20 in 64 or 31.3%
2 male 4 female - 15 in 64 or 23.4%
1 male 5 female - 6 in 64 or 9.4%
0 male 6 female - 1 in 64 or 1.6%

7 chicks

7 male 0 female - 1 in 128 or 0.8%
6 male 1 female - 7 in 128 or 5.5%
5 male 2 female - 21 in 128 or 16.4%
4 male 3 female - 35 in 128 or 27.3%
3 male 4 female - 35 in 128 or 27.3%
2 male 5 female - 21 in 128 or 16.4%
1 male 6 female - 7 in 128 or 5.5%
0 male 7 female - 1 in 128 or 0.8%

8 chicks

8 male 0 female - 1 in 256 or 0.4%
7 male 1 female - 8 in 256 or 3.1%
6 male 2 female - 28 in 256 or 10.9%
5 male 3 female - 56 in 256 or 21.9%
4 male 4 female - 70 in 256 or 27.3%
3 male 5 female - 56 in 256 or 21.9%
2 male 6 female - 28 in 256 or 10.9%
1 male 7 female - 8 in 256 or 3.1%
0 male 8 female - 1 in 256 or 0.4%

 

[Chickenmaven]

Ethics?

I question how "above board" hatcheries can be about straight run. If they are offering sexed birds of a variety, PLUS "straight run," wouldn't pulling the females out of the lot skew the number of males? Of course, it would!

 

[Ridgerunner]

The ethical hatcheries pull the straight run chicks out before the chicks are sexed. They can be ethical about it and I believe the major hatcheries that have been in business for a long time are.

 

[95yj]

yeah, I'm pretty sure that straight run is a random selection of the chicks straight off the line before any are sexed. If people consistently got 90% males in their straight run orders then they wouldn't be in business very long.