Should i get an incubator, or should i order some chicks from IDEAL?

[ninjascrub69]

Cant choose! AHHHHHHHHHHH

 

[shay20]

pststtt get an incubator, hehehe then you can order as many eggs you and all different breeds. and you can say you hatched them yourself.

 

[jarcoo0153]

I just order chicks, because I am so busy, I think that I would forget to tend to the incubator. Either way you will still get the same outcome, MORE CHICKENS!!

 

[ranchhand]

Depends upon what you're after.

If you want top quality, specific breeds and don't mind a 50% chance of roosters, get an incubator and order eggs from reputable breeders.

If you want non-show quality backyard flock chickens, but with only a 10% chance of roosters, order pullets from a hatchery.

 

[Cindiloohoo]

Bator

 

[Mahonri]

If you can eat or rehome roos. BATOR.

If you don't worry about quality ORDER..... and I will say, I've seen some pretty spectacular chicks come from a hatchery too.

 

[zazouse]

Order some buff O's and in6 to 8 months they will be your incubator.

 

[Dunkopf]

What Ranchhand said. It depends on what you're trying to do. There's nothing wrong with hatchery birds. If you want to show them or do 4H you should buy chicks or eggs from a breeder. If you just want a nice looking flock then pick a breed or breeds and buy from a hatchery. If you want to raise and sell pullets like a a lot of people do and want to use an incubator to bypass the cost of the chicks. Remember that most people want pullets only and if you can't tell the difference they are more difficult to sell.

Incubating isn't as easy as it sounds. If the temperature and humidity isn't close to perfect, you get a real low hatch rate. You should read some of the postings in the hatching section. You'll see that a lot of people have problems with temp and humidity. We had Hovabators and we live in Colorado where the humidity is real low. We wasted a lot of money on eggs with them. Then we got a Sportsman. It works great because it does a very good job of controlling humidity and temperature. It is expensive but for what we use it for it was a good investment.

 

[chickensioux]

Both

 

[jenjscott]

I started out with hatchery birds and within a year I had found out how much difference there was with the nice birds from good stock and had sold all my original stock to start over with the good stuff.