Order arrived dead :(

[Tracyree]

So I get the sense that a lot of folks are placing the blame on me, for ordering them in the summer. I placed the order during mild weather for the first available date. It is the hatcheries responsibility to delay shipping them if the weather is too hot, after placing the order it's not really in the customers control.

 

[SuperChiks]

Quote:
Are they CRAZY! A Heatpack! OMG

 

[1AcreRooster]

I wonder if its too hot to order eggs?

 

[RedDrgn]

I wouldn't blame the postal service - they don't have tracking like FedEx/UPS/etc. in the first place and only know when a package came/went from where it shipped and where it is intended to be received. Additionally, from our experience with USPS and chicks, they LOVE chick packages and handle them very very carefully (at least at our local office). They even called to let us know as soon as they arrived and let us in an hour and a half before normal business hours to pick them up. And it wasn't like we had a rapport with them for chicks...this was the first time we ever got chicks.

That said, I would point a finger at where you ordered from for adding a heat pack and shipping with temps well into the upper 90s and low 100s (can you imagine how hot that makes the interior of the mail trucks???). I can't fathom why they would have done, either, and overheating is the most likely culprit.

I'm sorry you lost them, though - very sad.

 

[pips&peeps]

I just got two started birds from Oklahoma (105) yesterday, and they arrived just fine this morning.

 

[CatDaddyAlbert]

I would ask for your money back....and when you get more birds when it cools down I would use a reputable hatchery.

NO reputable hatcher would ship birds from their location where it is hot to a location when it is as hot as it is in some area.

This is clearly irresponsible and VERY POOR business practice.

 

[Splinty]

Tracyree,
I ordered from Chickensforbackyards this past June. The 3 I ordered arrived in great condition and are thriving. I read somewhere that Chickensforbackyards is a broker and they use a hatchery in Ohio for their orders. I asked my husband (who works for the post office) to look up the zip they shipped from, Meyer Hatchery showed up. I'm not 100% sure that they shipped from them but Chickensforbackyards is located in Texas. Also when I spoke to a woman on the phone when asking questions before ordering, she said they ship from a hatchery in Ohio. I can confirm that at least at my husbands office they do understand the importance of the chicks and they call the people the minute the chicks arrive. I know this because He's the one that calls. He always calls me when he gets chicks in and has me listen to them chirping on the phone. He had an order come in right before we had our chicks and he left several messages for them to come pick them up. It took several hours for the people to arrive and he kept calling me saying he was worried about the chicks. He kept looking in the box to make sure they were all alive and doing good. During his last call to me he asked me to look up on what to do for them because they looked like they were panting and he wanted to give them water but didn't know if he should. (we didn't have ours at that time and being new to chickens he didn't want to do anything wrong) the woman walked in to pick them up. He told her what he wanted to do and she said that would have been fine and was grateful that he cared that much. So the point of this is that in most post offices, the workers do know how important it is to get them to you ASAP. He did say that the hatcheries should just ship overnight instead of priority. For what the hatcheries charge for shipping they can use overnight.

 

[~KH~]

Quote:
I wonder if ChickensforBackyards uses several different hatcheries because my order that shipped July 5 came from Lebanon MO which I believe is Cackle Hatchery.

 

[Boggy Bottom Bantams]

Quote:
have to agree 100%
I'm sorry for those blaming the heat, I'm near 100% sure it was too few in the box and not enough heat.
Day old chicks arent like shipping older birds, the hotter the better. Yes older birds by law techincally arent supposed to be shipped on days over 85 on the shipping or receiving end.
Now yes on chicks, they dont need to be placed outside in the middle of a parking lot for 12 hours, but if you know how the USPS runs, you'd know most of the chicks are kept inside the trucks with the drivers, 9 times out of 10 they are climate controled as well, when not in a truck or on a plane (climate controled as well), they are inside a building with the worker. Yes at day time hours they'd be fine, problem is when it gets dark and cools off to 65-70, well 4 will die then, just too cold for day olds to make it. This is why most have a 15-20 min order, for the body heat needed.
This time of year you can get by with a few less.

Personally I ship chicks every week, AND AM A REPUTABLE BREEDER. and I put heat packs in the box too on smaller orders even now.BIG difference is, I ONLY SHIP EXPRESS MAIL. Make a huge difference

How many have I lost? MAYBE 1-2 chicks per 100-150 chicks shipped out. The only big loss, 5 of 25 was due to the box being flipped, crushed and squished.

In all honesty, chicks fair 100 times better being shipped this time of year than those who jump the gun and start getting chicks shipped back in Feb and March.
go back and search some of those threads, post of whole box fulls DOA.

Anyway, I know a lot of you wont agree with that, which is fine, everyone has an opinion on the subject. But I have done this for many many years with no trouble on summer chick shipping. If there was a heat issue killing chicks, yes I would be a responsible breeder as always and stop, but that just hasnt been the case. Of all the years I have shipped birds, that case of 5 being dead from damage is the most I have ever lost in any shipment. Actually lost less than that for the entire year last year, 4 out of nearly 8,000 bantams and other birds shipped out.

For the poster who asked about too hot for eggs.
all depends, some can get hot enough to prematurly start incubating in extreme heat, some do just fine. A lot depends on packing methods. If well packed, and insulated, they still do OK.
A member on here has recently shipped me 100 call duck eggs, a few were early hatched (most likely started a day or so early from the shipping heat) but all in all, they did just fine.

Eggs I have been shipping have been reported back for the most part as being fine. There are just so many variables in them that the whole game of shipping eggs is a gamble.

 

[corancher]

I just received 28 chicks today and they were alive and well. Ohio to Colorado shipped on Tuesday afternoon priority mail.