The Middle Tennessee Thread

[littlechicklet]

Why do people ask to purchase birds and then they write that they are a large family and can't afford much? Or they want to resell so can't pay much as their profit needs to be bigger? OR I want to breed your birds and sell offspring next year and then tout your birds as their many years of work?

AAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

I am done selling anything. I am going to eat every darn thing I hatch that I don't like and will not sell anymore eggs...I will simply boil them and feed them to the dogs.

Thank you for listening to me vent. Those of you that have eggs or birds coming...those purchases/verbal promises will be honored and after that I am done.

 

[Cinny]

Why do people ask to purchase birds and then they write that they are a large family and can't afford much? Or they want to resell so can't pay much as their profit needs to be bigger? OR I want to breed your birds and sell offspring next year and then tout your birds as their many years of work?

AAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

I am done selling anything. I am going to eat every darn thing I hatch that I don't like and will not sell anymore eggs...I will simply boil them and feed them to the dogs.

Thank you for listening to me vent. Those of you that have eggs or birds coming...those purchases/verbal promises will be honored and after that I am done.

Sorry Lori.....I can imagine how frustrating that can be, especially when they see how wonderful your birds are!! They should be thanking you.....kind of like I did when I got our sweet little Silkie!

 

[BKPUCKETT]

I buy , sell , trade all the time, I enjoy it I meet a lot of nice people and some not so nice. I have made lots of friends trading chickens .You just gotta over look the bad ones. I'm not offended if someone offers me less (I just say yes or no thank you) With chickens there is the meat market,the show market, the pet market and so on . If the buyer and seller are form different markets there may be confusion.

I will see if my Barred Rock Bantam lay some eggs in the next day or two for your silkie.

 

[Happy Henhouse]

Yay! My incubator failed me on the eggs I got from you before. I only hatched one barred rock and then I lost her, too.

She was very sweet and so pretty! My little silkie will do a much better job.

 

[Penny Hen]

Good gracious no.

My post had nothing to do with yours. You are definitely not one of the idiots I have spoken to recently.

It was a generalization of many Craigslist and private contact sell people emails and not all of those are the ones I want to strangle....just the unique, won't stop emailing, idiots. I was offered $25 for one of my show Sebastopol geese and then he was mad when I POLITELY turned him down. Got somewhat rude and ugly to me. I don't even sell day olds for that!

I wonder what he would have said if you gave him the number of someone who sold plain Chinese weeder geese that was in his price range? The entitlement that some people feel is astounding! I am on that lower end and I don't think ANYONE should bring their prices down for me. I am considering getting a couple of Sebastopol eggs and having a friend hatch them for me because I can't afford the price of a live bird. I want to move into some of the higher range birds but I am starting with Easter Eggers because I can afford them and they are tough birds and lay well and large I love the blue/green egg.

It is called SAVE UP FOR THE EXPENSIVE THINGS! I was at a Rare Breeds Livestock Show some 13 years ago in Knoxville with some of my sheep. I saw a teenage girl who was sooo excited waiting for the sugar glider dealer to get there. She had saved up all year to be able to pay the $150 to $200 for it. I had to hang around because I couldn't imagine ANY little squirrel like pet that I would save that much allowance money for. The dealer arrived and I caught my first glimpse of them and I KNEW why. The big liquid eyes that you can fall into. Anyone who wants to pay that much less for your prize stock doesn't understand or appreciate them. On that reason alone I council not selling to them. They are likely to be the kind of folk you hear about getting their animals taken away for neglect.

 

[CityGirlintheCountry]

See? Penny Hen has hit it right on the head. If you want to buy crappy birds then sure, you can expect to pay very little. If you want to purchase birds where someone has spent a lot of time developing the line and has produced a fine quality bird then you should expect to pay for the quality.
When I started with silkies I sucked it up and paid a LOT of money for really good chicks from a well known breeder. It was worth it to start out with quality birds from a reputable breeder. I have spent time, money and energy trying to continue to develop my line. Same deal on my Ameraucanas. For years I have bred to get the bluest egg possible (and it is certainly a continuing work). Why would I sell those birds for little to nothing? Especially since the people I sell to are likely to turn around and become competitors? If you want a high quality bird you should expect to pay for it.

To build off part B of Lori's rant- If I have spent the money to purchase the original stock then it seems like cheating for someone to claim that their birds/eggs came from those lines when in fact their birds came from me. Their original stock came from me, not the breeders that I purchased from. If they want to claim that their birds/hatching eggs come from those lines then they need to purchase eggs from those lines. Otherwise it is a lie. They can claim that their lines came from me, but by now my birds are no longer Line A and Line B. They are Line C (my line). To say otherwise is wrong. If I were breeder A or breeder B I would be royally ****** that someone was using my name. Likewise, if someone buys my stock and then develops it for years and then claims that the offspring are my line it would also be wrong. The original stock came from me, but the result of multiple generations of breeding is not me.

I'm with Lori. I've gotten fairly selective about how I breed and how many I breed. I'm also fairly selective about who I sell to. If they are obnoxious or annoying then I am likely to just keep going. Arg.

(And this is not is reference to anyone that I have talked to about silkies. I am being slow there because I'm trying to get that pen fixed so the poor things won't look like muddy, drowned rats. Eventually I will get the additional pictures made. Sigh.)

 

[emmalynn]

He told me he could get them that cheap at the exotic auction. Show quality and all. Of course he didn't know the breeder. Didn't know what the "standard" is. Does not get the initials apa or aba..... I am just tired of working my as$ off for improvement in my flock to have people act like that.
Bkpuckett is right. There are different markets and if I am not getting sales requests based on show wins then it is obviously not my market.

 

[matlock585]

See? Penny Hen has hit it right on the head. If you want to buy crappy birds then sure, you can expect to pay very little. If you want to purchase birds where someone has spent a lot of time developing the line and has produced a fine quality bird then you should expect to pay for the quality.
When I started with silkies I sucked it up and paid a LOT of money for really good chicks from a well known breeder. It was worth it to start out with quality birds from a reputable breeder. I have spent time, money and energy trying to continue to develop my line. Same deal on my Ameraucanas. For years I have bred to get the bluest egg possible (and it is certainly a continuing work). Why would I sell those birds for little to nothing? Especially since the people I sell to are likely to turn around and become competitors? If you want a high quality bird you should expect to pay for it.

To build off part B of Lori's rant- If I have spent the money to purchase the original stock then it seems like cheating for someone to claim that their birds/eggs came from those lines when in fact their birds came from me. Their original stock came from me, not the breeders that I purchased from. If they want to claim that their birds/hatching eggs come from those lines then they need to purchase eggs from those lines. Otherwise it is a lie. They can claim that their lines came from me, but by now my birds are no longer Line A and Line B. They are Line C (my line). To say otherwise is wrong. If I were breeder A or breeder B I would be royally ****** that someone was using my name. Likewise, if someone buys my stock and then develops it for years and then claims that the offspring are my line it would also be wrong. The original stock came from me, but the result of multiple generations of breeding is not me.

I'm with Lori. I've gotten fairly selective about how I breed and how many I breed. I'm also fairly selective about who I sell to. If they are obnoxious or annoying then I am likely to just keep going. Arg.

(And this is not is reference to anyone that I have talked to about silkies. I am being slow there because I'm trying to get that pen fixed so the poor things won't look like muddy, drowned rats. Eventually I will get the additional pictures made. Sigh.)

Dang!!! I hope none of you take that opinion of me... my goodness! I've got near 3 dozen of Dmrippy's chicks in the brooder, and thank GOD for her kindness. I'd never sell them and I'm so grateful somebody took so much mercy and gave me probably a hundred dollars worth of eggs. That fire really has given me more than it took from me.
Thanks Donna!

 

[CarolJ]

Why do people ask to purchase birds and then they write that they are a large family and can't afford much? Or they want to resell so can't pay much as their profit needs to be bigger? OR I want to breed your birds and sell offspring next year and then tout your birds as their many years of work?

AAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

I am done selling anything. I am going to eat every darn thing I hatch that I don't like and will not sell anymore eggs...I will simply boil them and feed them to the dogs.

Thank you for listening to me vent. Those of you that have eggs or birds coming...those purchases/verbal promises will be honored and after that I am done.

I started to write a similar post yesterday, and then didn't. This past weekend I decided I was DONE with selling hatching eggs. Never again! 99% of the buyers are so nice and understand the risks involved in buying shipped eggs. And then you get the people who complain about ridiculous things. The woman who complained last week - she "only" got 4 chicks out of an order of eggs. I've bought shipped eggs and got zero chicks. Sometimes I've had great hatches, other times mediocre ones, and sometimes awful ones. It's a gamble. I sent her another order of eggs - she only had to pay for shipping - and she still complained - before she even got the extra eggs. I raise chickens because it is relaxing and fun. The headache of dealing with unreasonable people steals that enjoyment. I'm done with it.

So I understand your feelings completely.

 

[BKPUCKETT]

Girls girls remember the good forget the bad.