Murray McMurray Hatchery

[trudeaunicole]

Hi there! I just placed an order with Murray McMurray Hatchery and was wondering if anyone who has ordered from them before can let me know what to expect.

I have read previous threads about their shipping on weekends, but since they were from a few years back I was wondering if this policy has changed. I chose "give me all of my birds/eggs the week of May 15th"... does this mean I will receive the chicks on the 15th or at any random date throughout the week? I did see note they should arrive Sunday-Tuesday and I know I will receive a notification when they do ship but I was just wondering if anyone knew their tendencies! Do they overnight them after they hatch? Sorry for all of the questions and thanks for your patience!

In addition, I ordered five different breeds (BLRW, Partridge Rock, Red Star, SLW, and White Orpington). Will the chicks be marked by breed? Thank you for your input!

 

[BorealisChick71]

When I ordered chicks, last year, I also ordered from Murray McMurray. They ship on Friday's. Now, for many in the lower 48 (I happen to live in Alaska) this isn't a really big deal, as the birds arrive Saturday, and you let your post office know you're expecting them, and to call as soon as they're received. Even for us, they did arrive over the weekend, the poor things spent all of Sunday at our local post office, however, Monday morning arrived and we got a call at about 6:15 am that they were in, and we picked them up straight away. All 27 arrived healthy and in good condition. The birds will not be marked in any way, as to what breed they are. You will wind up having to figure that out on your own, just from how the chicks look. Ours were hatched May 8th last year, and our receive date was May 11th. We ordered some Partridge Rocks, and Light Brahma's, as well as a 15 count of their Meat and Egg combo. My only complaint was that we did not get what we were really supposed to with the Meat and Egg combo, as it was to be 10 meat birds, and 5 layers. We wound up with 7 meat birds and 8 layers, personally I figured, oh well, no big deal, it's still 15 birds, either way. The fun part was figuring out what the breeds of the other chickens were. Turned out we got a Black Minorca, a blue Andalusian, a Delaware, two brown Leghorns, a Partridge Rock, and a New Hampshire Red, and they threw a "free chick" in, which happened to be a blue Andalusian rooster, AND they gave us a free Partridge Rock Rooster (i ordered one, they gave me two). Over all, the experience was great. Birds were fantastic and healthy, and I'd definitely order from them again.

all of them their first day home.

and as pullets enjoying the yard in the beautiful Alaskan summer, watched over by our BT, Pig.


and then in October, and after all but one of the Cornish x's had been culled

 

[trudeaunicole]

Thank you for your response! You have beautiful birds your pictures are making me impatient! Though I was hoping they would be marked, maybe figuring out who is who will be fun like you stated. Were your roos marked? I'm glad you had such a positive experience- I'm hoping for the same! Can't wait!

 

[BeaverQB]

We ordered 20 White Rock roosters from McMurray last August and it was a great experience! All chicks arrived healthy and happy - and (surprisingly) all were sexed properly!

We love to let the kids look through the McMurray catalog, and we're planning to order some new heritage meat birds again this year from McMurray, and probably get each of the kids a new hen of their choosing, too!

 

[Cowgirl71]

I have been very happy with McMurray hatchery. Never had any DOA, except for a February order 7 years ago, when I think 3 out of 37 were DOA/died in the first 48 hours, which they promptly refunded me for. It was very cold though, I can't blame them or the Post Office for that. That was my very first chick order and I have since made sure not to get chicks any sooner than March, usually April or later, and haven't had any DOA from McMurray since.

I always pick up the chicks Monday morning and have been very happy with the health and vigor. I have ordered over 100 chicks from them, and sexing has been 100% accurate (quite impressive!), except for in my last order that included 6 Dark Cornish pullets, 2 of them turned out to be roosters. So evidently the Dark Cornish are a hard breed to sex.

No, they do not mark the chick breeds. Identifying them is half the fun! The breeds you ordered should be fairly easy to tell apart though. If you look on McMurray's website they even have pictures and a youtube clip of each breed, showing how to identify the different breeds as chicks. Once the chicks feather out (6 weeks) it'll be really easy to tell them apart.

 

[BorealisChick71]

Thank you for your response! You have beautiful birds your pictures are making me impatient! Though I was hoping they would be marked, maybe figuring out who is who will be fun like you stated. Were your roos marked? I'm glad you had such a positive experience- I'm hoping for the same! Can't wait!

No, there's no marking for any of them, as to breed, or sex. It's one of the fun to figure out things with them. Roo's make it pretty easy, they're usually the slowest to develop feathers, compared to the hens. This was the case especially with my Light and Dark Brahmas, very, very slow for the boys to get all their feathers. The Andalusian rooster we had, feathered almost as fast as the hen did, the give away with him, was the very pink comb at a young age. My Partridge rocks were a little longer in figuring out, but same thing, little slower in getting feathers, and their combs/wattles develop quicker and get more color to them, faster than the hens do. Hope you enjoy your chicken raising experience! It wasn't a first time for me, we raised chickens when I was young, living in Wisconsin, never got birds in the mail then, so that was a first, but for my DH, the whole experience was a new thing. He's really loved it though, and I think I've made a new chicken addict in the process of convincing him we should try this!

 

[trudeaunicole]

Thank you for all of the info! I grew up raising chickens but we never ordered from a hatchery. Just bought a house so that means I can finally start my coop! I'm hoping the same is true for my boyfriend- he's a little intimidated by my addiction already