Sandhill preserve?

[X43smitty]

Has anyone ever purchased birds from sandhillpreserve? I’m looking at the ayam cemani, wondering if they are good quality for the price , they are quite a bit cheaper then everywhere else, so I’m curious

 

[nuthatched]

It's hit or miss, more often miss. They *can* have decent birds but more often they aren't.
Their business practices are from 40 years ago, and are very hard to reach.
The had good birds 20 years ago but they they tried too many breeds at once instead of focusing on their goals

 

[dheltzel]

They have a huge selection of breeds, especially considering they are essentially a "mom and pop" operation. I think they have some helpers seasonally, but almost all the work is done by the owner, who I am friends with.
They do not try to compete on customer service and instant turnaround, which is what many customers demand today, having grow used to Amazon Prime and all the small web commerce sites that happily take your credit card and then send you stuff right away. Buying from Sand Hill requires more patience and flexibility than the average person is willing to put up with. Some breeds are quite impossible to find anywhere else. A decade ago, you could get dozens of his breeds from Ideal Hatchery in TX (all originally from Sand Hill), but a few years ago, they "threw in the towel" and stopped all those less popular breeds. I understand, they have employees to pay and infrastructure to amortize. Still, it is hard to see a second source for many rare breeds, just disappear like that. Through it all, Sand Hill plods along, maintaining their gene stocks as well as they can (last year, a coon manage to wipe out the remaining flock of Manx Rumpies they had, and those are probably now extinct in the US - the result of poultry keepers in the US relying on Sand Hill to do what they really should be doing, many breeds are like this, one catastrophe from extinction).

To address the original post - their Ayam cemanis are amazing, among the best in the country, IMO. I sent the original stock to him, you can see more pics and videos on my website: http://welbars.com/index.php/ayam-cemani/

I did warn him several times that pricing them that low would call into question the quality, and suggested he set the price at $50 (as I do) and the number per order much lower, then just give the customers extra cemani chicks as a "gift" (let's say you order 4 for $200 and he sends you 10 instead of 4 - talk about delighted!). He disagreed with the entire premise that you must charge more to make people think the quality is high. I hope he is right. Some customers are going to really get "lucky" if they assume the quality is only average, but want them anyway. There are breeders out there that specialize in Ayam cemani and charge over $100 per chick. They could never wrap their head around the fact that they could purchase chicks for $12.50 that would in fact be a genetic upgrade to their expensive pens of breeders. So please don't tell them, they won't sleep well at night if they find out!

 

[X43smitty]

They have a huge selection of breeds, especially considering they are essentially a "mom and pop" operation. I think they have some helpers seasonally, but almost all the work is done by the owner, who I am friends with.
They do not try to compete on customer service and instant turnaround, which is what many customers demand today, having grow used to Amazon Prime and all the small web commerce sites that happily take your credit card and then send you stuff right away. Buying from Sand Hill requires more patience and flexibility than the average person is willing to put up with. Some breeds are quite impossible to find anywhere else. A decade ago, you could get dozens of his breeds from Ideal Hatchery in TX (all originally from Sand Hill), but a few years ago, they "threw in the towel" and stopped all those less popular breeds. I understand, they have employees to pay and infrastructure to amortize. Still, it is hard to see a second source for many rare breeds, just disappear like that. Through it all, Sand Hill plods along, maintaining their gene stocks as well as they can (last year, a coon manage to wipe out the remaining flock of Manx Rumpies they had, and those are probably now extinct in the US - the result of poultry keepers in the US relying on Sand Hill to do what they really should be doing, many breeds are like this, one catastrophe from extinction).

To address the original post - their Ayam cemanis are amazing, among the best in the country, IMO. I sent the original stock to him, you can see more pics and videos on my website: http://welbars.com/index.php/ayam-cemani/

I did warn him several times that pricing them that low would call into question the quality, and suggested he set the price at $50 (as I do) and the number per order much lower, then just give the customers extra cemani chicks as a "gift" (let's say you order 4 for $200 and he sends you 10 instead of 4 - talk about delighted!). He disagreed with the entire premise that you must charge more to make people think the quality is high. I hope he is right. Some customers are going to really get "lucky" if they assume the quality is only average, but want them anyway. There are breeders out there that specialize in Ayam cemani and charge over $100 per chick. They could never wrap their head around the fact that they could purchase chicks for $12.50 that would in fact be a genetic upgrade to their expensive pens of breeders. So please don't tell them, they won't sleep well at night if they find out!View attachment 3728651

Thank you, for your reply, that is my
Hope is to get multiple breeds and keep them pure, in your opinion, what birds would you suggest to someone that wants to own good birds and cares more about the breed then the money I can make, I’d like to order either from you , or sandhill preserve, or both

 

[TexasBlues]

@dhetzel do you ever ship hatching eggs or only chicks?

 

[DLA]

@dhetzel do you ever ship hatching eggs or only chicks?

@dheltzel

 

[Adorae]

If you go to his website he says he doesn't really like to ship eggs because the post office destroys them. He has his contact information as an email for the best way to get ahold of him.