The grey is fairly pretty (remember I am a silkie hater, lol). I guess if you used the lavendar just to introduce the lavendar genes into your silkies, you could breed some nice ones after a while.
wow those are some nice hatchery stock birds i have seen some hatchery horror storys too very impressed could you expect this kind of quality everytime?
i have had good results form ideal as well the barred rocks are great a lot better than the ones i got from mc murray, the rhode island reds are very good looking, some of my silver laced wyandotte are also great, only bad ones i got from them where the welsummers(not that bad i just have 2 hens and 1 roo from a breeder so they kinda get compared to them almost not fair for them) and the golden laced wyandotte(they are the worst golden laced i have ever saw), but overall yes i was highly satisfied with ideal and if ever in the need for more that is where i would go
I have a mille de fleur and a black silkie(even though it was supposed to be blue) from Ideal. The silkie has an average crest, not SQ, but better than some that I've seen on this thread. The mille de fleur is very cute, looks like a mille de fleur.
I got this black cochin in the Bantam special. He is well worth the 99 cents i paid!! He is a beauty. I also have partridge rock, white rock and barred rocks from them and they are beauties as well. I have a beautiful little black japanese that came in the same group as this one. I love Ideal and am getting 75 laying hens next week from them. I got 2 black silkies in the group that are not too bad looking. They are nice little birds.