speakup4kids, I am so sorry to hear about your experience. If I read your posts correctly, your children handled the chicks at the breeder's facility, in front of the breeder. If she had any questions or concern about their ability to safely handle what were then HER babies, she should have raised them at that time. If she saw rough handling that had her worried about chicks being killed by the children she should have addressed that then and NOT sold them to you. Since you DID take chicks home that day, it seems that her concerns came after the death.
I breed dogs, I do not breed chickens, so the comments I make below may not apply to birds. If they don't, please feel free to correct me. As a dog breeder I screen for a variety of health issues that could potentially be passed on to our puppies. We only breed to dogs who have had the same. That said, genetics is a crap-shoot and sometimes an undesireable trait does sneak through. We believe that by doing clearances on our dogs we can eliminate those with known heritable issues from our breeding program by spaying/neutering them. I breed with my own needs (showing/performance) in mind first, hoping that each pup available to a companion home will also make a wonderful, beautiful, healthy pet. We ask that full families come to see our dogs and visit the puppies. If I have ANY concern about a family member's handling or behavior around the dogs I DO NOT SEND A PUPPY WITH THEM.
I believe that there are few chicken breeders out there who screen for genetic defects beyond traits that are visually notable. (Extra toes is visually notable, cardiac defects are not). Keep in mind the huge numbers of people out there who have hens and a roo producing chicks for sale compared to the RELATIVELY FEW who have true dedication to producing a "line" for either showing or production and longevity. This is not a criticism of chicken breeders ... animals produced for agricultural use are often raised differently than those bred as companions. If someone raises spring chicks with the intent of putting them in the freezer in the fall, what does it matter if they don't have a natural life expectancy of 15-20 years ... I'm not criticizing, merely pointing out that agricultural vs companion are totally different uses!
If one of my puppies died while with its new owners I would push for a necropsy ... not because I thought that children killed it, but because I would worry that we'd unknowingly produced a health problem. If we had, I would strongly consider NOT breeding the parents again and I would "replace" the puppy with one from my next available litter. On the two occasions in the last 30 years that one of our puppies has died, we replaced both. One had ingested poison (presumably set out for rodent control at the family camp) and the other had ingested fluff from a toy, causing peritonitis. Neither was "my fault" but I provided replacement, treating those families as I would want to be treated if it were me that had lost a loved companion.
The law of averages would say that once in every "x" many offspring a genetic health glitch may happen. Consider the hen that produces hundreds of potentially hatched eggs each year. Odds are in those numbers will be a few with "failure to thrive", either in the egg or after hatching. Maybe your child's pet was one of those poor chicks destined to not make it. Regardless, I fully agree with the person that said it's bad business practice to not replace the lost chick and to INSULT THE CUSTOMER.
We raised 20 hatchery day-old chicks this year. One was weak upon arrival and didn't survive overnight. The hatchery has no idea of how many children I may have had handle them or ages/behavior of them. Regardless, upon notification they did offer a refund on that chick. We also had one chick that has a few "issues" and has not thrived as the others have (very late to feather, much less energetic). I am sure I could contact the hatchery and complain, or I could have culled her within their 48 hour window and gotten a refund. We chose to give her a chance and she's now 8 weeks old, with odd posture and behavior, but an excellent pet. I think she was from a "bad egg" from that 1 in "x" many that will come along.
It's too bad that the one lost was one that had been selected by your 9 year old.
speakup4Kids, I believe you did the right thing by contacting the breeder. If it were me, I would ask for a refund of the purchase price of that bird and would seek another chick elsewhere, despite the considerable inconvenience of quarrantining a new chick.
