Sort of frustrated with Hoover's Hatchery, but giving them another chance.

[LaurenRitz]

I'd thought about that, but they get frostbite on their big combs and wattles, and don't lay as much as chanteclers.

My one surviving Jersey Giant (currently 1.5 years old) lays 6-7 per week during spring and summer. She was one of the first to start laying again this spring

 

[Chicken_tiger_catt]

Late last year I put in an order with Hoover's Hatchery for 22 Partridge Chanteclers. 15 pullets and 7 cockerels. My plan was to keep nearly all the pullets, minus any that had obvious genetic defects, and keep the two best cockerels for breeding purposes wow butchering the remaining five. I live in the same town as cackle hatchery, and if they carried Partridge Chanteclers I just pick them up from there in person. But alas, no one near me has this breed so shipping chicks was the next option. I place an order to be shipped on January 31st, they arrived two days later. Unfortunately, and I should have planned for this, there were four dead and three would fade over the next 48 hours. I contacted Hoovers and they promptly refunded the seven that it died. At that point I was down to 15 birds. 2 weeks later 2 chicks escaped and a field rat finish them off leaving me with 13 birds. My fault.

Here's where it gets frustrating. Now that I've had the birds for almost 5 weeks, and they've started to grow quite a bit, I realized that a number of them were not partridge chanteclers. 5 of the remaining 13 birds have single or pea combs, instead of the fusion combs chanteclers have.
I contacted Hoover's Hatchery again and they promptly refunded me and I ordered another 15 after they apologize for the mix-up. But how do you have a mix-up like that? I did some digging on this website and found someone else that ordered this breed last year and ended up with a decent number of Partridge rocks.
Anyways, I guess I'm just venting a little bit. A month of feed into a couple of dozen birds really isn't much. It's $15 in the grand scheme of things. But now I'm also feeding chickens of a breed that I'm not sure what they are and didn't plan on raising them in the first place.

hoover's is terrible

 

[Mantisquailman]

hoover's is terrible

I guess I'll give them a try. ( I just ordered ducklings )

 

[Chicken_tiger_catt]

I guess I'll give them a try. ( I just ordered ducklings )

dude........ just go to Tractor Supply.

 

[Mantisquailman]

But tractor supply gets their chicks and ducks from hoovers

 

[NatJ]

But tractor supply gets their chicks and ducks from hoovers

I thought that was the point: same actual source of the chicks or ducklings, but Tractor Supply gets to deal with any that die while being shipped. I can see that as a possible benefit.

On the other hand, having them shipped directly to you from Hoovers will mean TSC cannot mis-label them or mix them with anything else, so you have a better chance of getting the kind you think you are getting.

 

[Mantisquailman]

Also all the TSCs around me are sold out of khaki Campbell ducks

 

[NatJ]

Also all the TSCs around me are sold out of khaki Campbell ducks

That sounds like an excellent reason not to buy in the store, since the store doesn't have them anyway