Meyer Hatchery 2 questions please

[Merrymouse]

Im not giving up on getting chicks at all. I just spent $$$$ and lots and lots of hours building a castle in my backyard for them. I think I can't call Meyer until this day is over. They gave me a delivery date of Tues 3/14 through Thurs 3/16 so Im sure they wont do anything for me yet. Ill have to see what they say and what breeds they can offer to reship and when they can do that. The other problem is I have a job, darn inconvenient I wish I was independently wealthy and could just sit on my sofa waiting for chicks to arrive, while furiously checking with post offices and tracking numbers but unfortunately I have to work for a living and don't think I can take another three days off next week. I'm also going to look for a local source. I tried this initially without much luck. If anyone knows of any reputable places driving distance from MA I would love to hear about them. Im really, really trying to pull on my big girl pants but it still stinks, waiting and hoping, hoping and waiting but it may be time to come to terms with the facts.

 

[SunHwaKwon]

Unfortunately their incentive is to ship, even into the teeth of a storm like this. If they don't then the chicks are a total loss, I assume. I'm sure they just destroy them in that case. They're certainly not in the business of raising un-shippable (i.e. several day old) chicks. So they'll be very inclined to ship, hoping that the customer gets them in intact, or mostly so. And that the customer doesn't blame them, but the weather, or the postal service (who may indeed be at least partly culpable, no doubt, but there's only so much they can do in such conditions).

Of course that's balanced against the dynamic of customer satisfaction and therefore repeat business (as well as word of mouth references and online reviews). I have no idea how they normally rate, in all respects. Nor how they compare to other hatcheries, in the case of this storm and in the larger picture. Maybe they should have been more circumspect about shipping into the teeth of such a certain storm, though we know how weather forecasting can be, and hindsight is 20/20. Those can be tough calls, as anybody who has experience with weather affecting their business knows all too well. (I'm a retired pilot, so I have lots of that myself and sympathize.) I am not defending the hatchery here. I don't have enough information nor experience with their business to really know one way or the other. I'm just thinking this through myself.

So here's another way to look at this. If they hadn't shipped them they would have all died, being destroyed by the hatchery (again, I'm assuming this, so correct me if I'm wrong. Maybe they have a way of selling older chicks thru retail outlets.) And if they die enroute from the cold, it probably isn't as painful and awful a death as we would think. Hypothermia is actually a rather easy way to go, even for humans. After some violent shivering (not pleasant, but not painful) generally comes unconsciousness, and then death. This makes it a rather insidious condition for us, and therefore dangerous. But not the worse way to go.

I'm sure some will be horrified by this rather clinical perspective, but I'm just trying to be objective here, and put aside my emotion. I fully realize the emotional impact this is having on Merrymouse and would experience very much the same if it were "my chicks." It sucks, for sure.

Maybe this helps, maybe not. Go ahead all you who want to throw rotten tomatoes at me for this. I can take it.

Bottom line is that I hope they make it through, and in good shape. And if not then at least it looks like Meyer will replace them under their guarantee (though I know that's not the whole issue here!).

Good luck to you, Merrymouse, and to your chicks.

The NY "Poultry Hatchery" put on the FB page that they would not be shipping any of their Tuesday/Wednesday hatch and would be closed because of the storm. I asked what will happen to the chicks and they said they put them up for sale at a discount price. This is also what Cackle does with their overhatch.

 

[biophiliac]

GREE w/all the recent comments. You WILL have a nice little flock soon .Don't lose hope yet for these chicks. Meyer is a reputable hatchery, sometimes bad luck intervenes. I hope you will be spared a heartbreak over this shipment, but if not carry on - it goes with caring for animals. Your coop build and preparations are inspiring. Also, if you decide to look for chicks locally...i googled and found a small local hatchery about 45 mins from me where i got my chicks last year...and more recently i have found more small local sources, they are just alittle harder to find. Its probably the same in your area.. They dont have the variety of the large hatcherys but did have BO, BR, EE, Australorps, Wyandottes and several others.

 

[SunHwaKwon]

I’ve never had shipped chicks arrive that late. I have had a chick hatch on a Monday and the hen not bring her chicks off the nest to eat or drink until Friday so it’s possible they can go longer than 72 hours without food or water. This may be more of an issue to the chicks than just the cold. The post office has certain protocols on how they are supposed to handle the chicks, the cold may not be the real threat, the delay and food and water would concern me more. A lot of that depends on how well the employees follow those protocols and you just don’t know. All you can do is wait.

I agree to contact Meyer after they arrive if you have issues. They are a reputable company. Talk to them and see what they can do. You’ve had rotten luck on this storm hitting right now. It’s unlikely you’ll get anything like this again on a reshipment.

I never really thought about that, maybe because my PO seems to freak out when chicks arrive lol (in a good, concerned way, though). I would expect that if they are agreeing to ship these animals that they would, as you have pointed out, have protocols to follow to at the very least limit their liability when it comes to the deaths, since USPS is a business just like any other and it comes down to $$$, so chicks that die or don't arrive due to improper handling is a monetary loss to them when they have to refund shipping costs.

 

[Nathan J]

I asked what will happen to the chicks and they said they put them up for sale at a discount price. This is also what Cackle does with their overhatch.

Yeah, but they can't ship them, and that limits the customer base by a lot. Hey, I hope they sell all the chicks they hatch, but I'm skeptical of that. But I could be wrong!

 

[SunHwaKwon]

Yeah, but they can't ship them, and that limits the customer base by a lot. Hey, I hope they sell all the chicks they hatch, but I'm skeptical of that. But I could be wrong!

Actually you got me curious about it, and the Poultry Hatchery has this on their website:

NO KILL POULTRY HATCHERY​

Many might assume that we disregard our male chicks and unwanted or unsold chicks and dispose of them in inhumane ways. We do not and we will never! We hatch according to our sales, we do not over breed at The Poultry Hatchery. We believe that we should take care and watch over what God has given us not kill it because it’s a male chick or we over hatched. Our males and unsold chicks are raised on our 300+ acre farm or donated to selected farms where they are raised for meat and donated to local food pantries and churches. These local farms must meet or exceeds the same expectations of humane raising we employ at The Poultry Hatchery.

I thought that's pretty nice. Obviously not all (in fact probably not most) hatcheries follow those practices.

 

[bajabirdbrain]

Im not giving up on getting chicks at all. I just spent $$$$ and lots and lots of hours building a castle in my backyard for them. I think I can't call Meyer until this day is over. They gave me a delivery date of Tues 3/14 through Thurs 3/16 so Im sure they wont do anything for me yet. Ill have to see what they say and what breeds they can offer to reship and when they can do that. The other problem is I have a job, darn inconvenient I wish I was independently wealthy and could just sit on my sofa waiting for chicks to arrive, while furiously checking with post offices and tracking numbers but unfortunately I have to work for a living and don't think I can take another three days off next week. I'm also going to look for a local source. I tried this initially without much luck. If anyone knows of any reputable places driving distance from MA I would love to hear about them. Im really, really trying to pull on my big girl pants but it still stinks, waiting and hoping, hoping and waiting but it may be time to come to terms with the facts.

Would be very nice IF there is somebody near you that can be a surrogate to your chicks when you need to be away. We have a couple of people in our neighborhood that should fill that mission for us if we need to be away for awhile. It is not realistic to think you or us will be watching our flocks 24/7 and the need for backups is needed. We are going to be very choosy about who is going to be our backups, the neighbor who has the chickens that BB has been watching for several years is NOT an acceptable person to watch ours, sadly.

Wish we were neighbors as being able to help one another out in stressful times would be mutually beneficial. Again, good luck. BB

 

[Nathan J]

Many might assume that we disregard our male chicks and unwanted or unsold chicks and dispose of them in inhumane ways. We do not and we will never!

Hmmmm, call me cynical but I see an out here. They could still dispose of in humane ways and still be in compliance with their statement (and that's quite subjective though I will say I think there is a legitimate distinction to be made).

Hey, there's a LOT I don't know about hatching eggs and just how precise they can be in getting exactly how many chicks they need, and actually selling all of them. But if they sell every single hatched chick I'll eat my hat!

That said, I'm sure they try to get it as close as possible, for economic reasons if nothing else. It costs money to run incubators for eggs that won't produce salable chicks.

 

[debid]

@bajabirdbrain

The best chicken sitters aren't necessarily chicken owners. For biosecurity, it's preferable to me that they aren't, actually. But people who don't already have their own ideas about how things should be done are far more likely to follow your instructions...

 

[av8torcrj]

This is going to sound cynical but having been an airline pilot and witnessed the boxes of chicks sitting on the tarmac in the cold, in the wind, in the rain, sitting in a scorching sun baked baggage cart and having ordered dozens of shipments of poultry myself I can attest that for the most part the only person who really really REALLY cares about your birds once they leave the hatchery is YOU. For most enroute handling the little brown box with holes is just a curiousity that makes noise and needs to be moved down range as part of a job. I've encountered a few workers that take an extra step in affording the birds a comfortable trip but the reality is these people haven't spent hours on BYC studying the care of new hatchlings. Fortunately the hatcheries do their best in general to assure the safe transport against what at times are challenging odds. My very first shipment from McMurray didn't survive the cold in Minneapolis. I was crushed. I saw to it the replacement order got the royal treatment. I determined the fight they would be on, called the gate agent, she got the captain on the phone, he went down to the cargo hold and retrieved my birds and they flew in the cockpit of a DC9 to Memphis. This was against every protocol and rule but I was determined to get them into my hands this time and out of the hands of the USPS as quickly as possible. They all arrived happy and healthy. This was probably 15 years ago. I now never order birds during cold weather (it's a pain once they get here anyway) and watch the forecast like a hawk.