What gender might these little ones be?

[MamaWolf7]

With that many health issues I would find somewhere else to get chicks from next time!

 

[JK93]

With that many health issues I would find somewhere else to get chicks from next time!

I'm thinking of hatching, I went to a breeder and got chicks after losing one from mpc and all of those ones came with coccidiosis. I've had really awful luck so far.

 

[MamaWolf7]

I'm thinking of hatching, I went to a breeder and got chicks after losing one from mpc and all of those ones came with coccidiosis. I've had really awful luck so far.

That is so sad!

Last year I hatched my own chicks. Ended up with 6 cockerels and 1 pullet. 2 cockerels had crooked toes. I was able to correct one of their toes with toothpicks and painters tape, only to later learn i had a lot of meat birds.

This year I purchased 12 chicks from a farm and 10 from a hatchery. All of the hatchery chicks were exactly what I paid for...healthy females who have recently started laying. Of the 12 I lost a pullet to my husky , a pullet died of unknown causes overnight at 10 weeks and a cockerel had wry neck which I was able to nurse him to good health (then learned he was a male).

Before I thought I was having bad luck, but after hearing all of this I think I have had it rather easy.

 

[JK93]

That is so sad!

Last year I hatched my own chicks. Ended up with 6 cockerels and 1 pullet. 2 cockerels had crooked toes. I was able to correct one of their toes with toothpicks and painters tape, only to later learn i had a lot of meat birds.

This year I purchased 12 chicks from a farm and 10 from a hatchery. All of the hatchery chicks were exactly what I paid for...healthy females who have recently started laying. Of the 12 I lost a pullet to my husky , a pullet died of unknown causes overnight at 10 weeks and a cockerel had wry neck which I was able to nurse him to good health (then learned he was a male).

Before I thought I was having bad luck, but after hearing all of this I think I have had it rather easy.

Oh man you've also had some bad luck as well! That's my fear with hatching, I can't have roosters where I'm at! Hopefully next round of chicks luck is on our side!

 

[MamaWolf7]

Oh man you've also had some bad luck as well! That's my fear with hatching, I can't have roosters where I'm at! Hopefully next round of chicks luck is on our side!

Absolutely!

If you were to consider getting a dual purpose sex-linked hybrid breed or an easy to identify breed like the barred Plymouth rock, you could totally hatch your own and not worry about gender. If upon hatching it turns out to be male, put it on a grower feed as soon as is recommended and the day it crows send it to freezer camp.

You would definitely want a dual purpose breed so you can enjoy a decent size meal with the males and lots of eggs from females. That is why more than half of my flock are barred rocks. The girls are classified as "very good" layers and give me anywhere from medium to jumbo eggs. In their prime they give me 13 eggs every 2 weeks. They are cold hardy (I live 100mi from Alaska) and can handle confinement well (we have very long cold winters so a must for my birds).

Since you obviously do not have a rooster, you must be buying fertilized eggs. Incubating your own ensures they do not come with mites, but does nothing to prevent health issues caused by inbreeding.

Just food for thought!

 

[CFLRanching]

All of these chicks came from MPC online hatchery, I'm suspecting at least 2 are male but I'm brand new to this and would love any input if you think I have some boys in my all female order lol.

First 2 pictures are of my b/b/s orp
Next 3 pictures are my SF
Last picture is of my mille fluer d'uccle.
(All bought as female, and 4.5 weeks of age.)

We had two D' Uccles for the longest time we thought they were males until they both turned out to be females. Those little booted bantams are hard to sex that young. I'm not saying it's not a cockerel (because it definitely makes you think it is) BUT like I said we had two that for the life of me I would have pegged male but they were female. Only time will tell.
.

 

[Auntiejessi3]

I plan to do so, I've been refunded from this hatch already when one of my other silkie chicks died of neurological disorders. My surviving silkie from them has cross beak my SF has something going on with her beak as it can barely close completely which you might notice in the pics, and one of my other orps has an oddly long droopy looking beak as well. Truthfully out of 6 only 2 have looked and acted healthy from my order.

That's crazy! I've ordered from them twice over 2 years and gotten beautiful birds..

 

[JK93]

Absolutely!

If you were to consider getting a dual purpose sex-linked hybrid breed or an easy to identify breed like the barred Plymouth rock, you could totally hatch your own and not worry about gender. If upon hatching it turns out to be male, put it on a grower feed as soon as is recommended and the day it crows send it to freezer camp.

You would definitely want a dual purpose breed so you can enjoy a decent size meal with the males and lots of eggs from females. That is why more than half of my flock are barred rocks. The girls are classified as "very good" layers and give me anywhere from medium to jumbo eggs. In their prime they give me 13 eggs every 2 weeks. They are cold hardy (I live 100mi from Alaska) and can handle confinement well (we have very long cold winters so a must for my birds).

Since you obviously do not have a rooster, you must be buying fertilized eggs. Incubating your own ensures they do not come with mites, but does nothing to prevent health issues caused by inbreeding.

Just food for thought!

I will look into them! Thank you so much for your advice and sharing your experience, it is so appreciated! Truthfully I haven't had it in me to cull or send anything to freezer camp yet. I don't know if I will have that in me or if that's something that comes with time. This is my first time ever owning or even being around chickens, (I know no one locally to even discuss chickens with or to reach out for troubleshooting haha) so I'm very soft about them still haha. I had 2 male pekin ducks over the summer as my first introduction to poultry that I raised thinking they would be females and if not we could send them to freezer camp anddddd I ended up rehoming all 30 pounds of those boys because I just didn't have it in me. I swore I would be stronger and tough when I got chickens and do what I needed to do but now I'm right back in the same boat of internally being filled with marshmallow fluff towards them haha. I really hope I get tougher and am able to cull and send my birds to freezer camp in the future though. This experience with deformed and diseased chicks and the lack of vets in my area (they won't even do a fecal if you say the word chicks) has really made me feel like I should put in tons of OT at work and save every penny up to buy land and start up a small scale selective breeding program to really weed out a lot of the bad stuff I got unlucky with, but I need to be tough and able to cull before I even toy with that idea haha.

 

[JK93]

We had two D' Uccles for the longest time we thought they were males until they both turned out to be females. Those little booted bantams are hard to sex that young. I'm not saying it's not a cockerel (because it definitely makes you think it is) BUT like I said we had two that for the life of me I would have pegged male but they were female. Only time will tell.
.

My little man/woman will be staying until the first crow and I'm 100% positive, I wish I lived somewhere I could have roos because a tiny d'uccle roo with the big orp ladies who even as chicks have consistently acted like this tiny bird is invisible and doesn't exist in their orp world would be pretty funny.

 

[kurby22]

Thanks! I wouldn't say Nutmeg (d'uccle) looks over the other ladies, but maybe he is and his version is just fighting with and being very anti-Corn Pop (SF) since day 1 which is understandable that bird has been a real jerk since day 1. I can't keep roosters where I'm at so if Corn Pop can't turn it around I'm not sure how my flock dynamics will work out with keeping her if Nutmeg isn't in constant battle with her.

The chest bumping eventually works itself out, I wouldn't worry about that! I had two Ameraucana boys that challenged each other all the time as babies and grew up to be very good friends that relied on each other a lot. It's a lot like siblings...love but disagreements as kids.