Why Do People Buy Live Chicks From Breeders and Farm Stores‭?

[Shadrach]

I'll talk take a selfie. (from you)

I am curious what age you are.


edited my typo.

Pffft, not a chance
I'm 63.

 

[townchicks]

I agree with you. Unfortunately while such people are learninng, chickens are dying.
Mixing ethics and prcticality again, learning and making mistakes while making lamps for example, as I do, is fine, the piece of wood doesn't suffer, it's an object; chickens are not.
Good post btw.

This is true, but I have learned over the years of working with other peoples' animals as a groomer and a vet assistant, this applies to all animals, not just chickens. On more than one occasion I have thought, after dealing with a client, why do they even have a dog? And EVERYBODY thinks they know what they are doing with their dogs," they've had dogs since they were kids". Yet, animal shelters are full to bursting, dogs and cats and yes, chickens, are dumped in the country to fend for themselves. "Starter pets" like hamsters, rabbits and parakeets bought for kids "to teach them responsibility", only teach them that it's ok to get rid of an animal when you are bored with it, because that's what their parents do when the kids stop taking responsibility. Don't even get me started on the way some people neglect and abuse and even murder their own children. It's the way humans can be. All we can do is try to be better than that ourselves, and try to educate when we can. Most, if not all, of us have come to this site to learn to be better. Lots of people out in the world don't bother. Lets all keep that in mind, and appreciate our common choice to be better chicken keepers.

 

[Kiki]

Pffft, not a chance
I'm 63.

 

[Dona Worry]

I agree with you. Unfortunately while such people are learninng, chickens are dying.
Mixing ethics and prcticality again, learning and making mistakes while making lamps for example, as I do, is fine, the piece of wood doesn't suffer, it's an object; chickens are not.
Good post btw.

Chickens don't have a very long life expectancy. Of COURSE it is sad when one dies--I cried at the loss of a baby chick this spring-- the facts of the matter is chickens rarely make it to 10 years old, and most find themselves in the soup pot years before that.

Sorry OP, but you come across as an arrogant know it all, who thinks only the elite should be allowed to have chickens, and I do not agree.

Even with a steep learning curve, and totally preventable losses, I think the average backyard chicken lives a much better life that your average battery hen or commercial meat bird. There is also real satisfaction in eating your own eggs and knowing your own birds, and no, I don't think we should take that away just because you think you know better!
Am I reading this right? You don't even have your own birds, and of the birds you are responsible for, loose so many to predators that most birds don't even last two years?
And here you are, chiding people for buying and shipping chicks? Come on.

 

[aart]

Sorry OP, but you come across as an arrogant know it all, who thinks only the elite should be allowed to have chickens, and I do not agree.

No, no, he saved these birds from the 'elite'.
(Read with facetious font)

 

[Dona Worry]

Also to address you 'Wanting something doesn't mean you have a right to have it!' snark, I've got news for you: If you want a chicken, and live in an area where you can keep them, guess what?! You TOTALLY have the right to buy a chicken! Chickens are animals, livestock, and can be legally bought and sold and if I want to buy chickens, as a matter if fact, I have the right to do so.

 

[1cock2hens]

Overflowing with that BYC spirit

 

[Dona Worry]

Overflowing with that BYC spirit

My problem with the attitude OP presents is 1) it doesn't take commercial egg production into account and 2) OP doesn't seem all that experienced in the first place.
Think about it-- if a family is going to eat eggs, they are going to eat eggs. Now, maybe in a perfect world all chickens would have lovely little family groups with their mummies and daddies, but we don't live in that world. If that family is told "THIS is how you raise chickens, and if you can't do that, don't get them!" then sure, they might not get chickens, and the BYC community can pat themselves on the back for averting a crisis.
But, that family still eats eggs, so they will get the eggs from battery hens, and I think that it is a very, very rare individual that would keep chickens in conditions worse than a commercial egg farm. All discouraging the new chicken enthusiast did was move the the hen to where the BYC community couldn't see it, and so gets to pretend she doesn't exist and therefore, no suffering!
I'd rather see 100 incompetent individual owners than a commercial egg farm, but that's just me. And no, I'm not about to petition to close down chicken farms, but I also don't buy eggs from them either.

 

[1cock2hens]

My problem with the attitude OP presents is 1) it doesn't take commercial egg production into account and 2) OP doesn't seem all that experienced in the first place.
Think about it-- if a family is going to eat eggs, they are going to eat eggs. Now, maybe in a perfect world all chickens would have lovely little family groups with their mummies and daddies, but we don't live in that world. If that family is told "THIS is how you raise chickens, and if you can't do that, don't get them!" then sure, they might not get chickens, and the BYC community can pat themselves on the back for averting a crisis.
But, that family still eats eggs, so they will get the eggs from battery hens, and I think that it is a very, very rare individual that would keep chickens in conditions worse than a commercial egg farm. All discouraging the new chicken enthusiast did was move the the hen to where the BYC community couldn't see it, and so gets to pretend she doesn't exist and therefore, no suffering!
I'd rather see 100 incompetent individual owners than a commercial egg farm, but that's just me. And no, I'm not about to petition to close down chicken farms, but I also don't buy eggs from them either.

roflmao you dont have to get defensive with me, i frankly dont care. not even enough to read your post fully // try having some byc spirit and working together. you dont have to agree. just because you dont agree doesnt mean you have to act angry and defensive. not the only thread i have seen this from you. hope everything is ok

 

[Shadrach]

@ aart, @Donna Worry @1cock2hens
Lovely aren't they.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/articles/some-chicken-photographs.74471/
The point you seem incapable of understanding is I don't have much of a choice about how these chickens are kept. They are not my chickens.
If you had seen what it was like here before then you might think differently, but I doubt it.
Also, the assumption that you have 'own' chickens in order to care about them, or know anything about chicken keeping shows a very limited grasp of reality.
Before I came here on average they lost a chicken a month. Can you get it in to your heads that the people who own the chickens don't care.
They hardly ever got cleaned out. The feed was rotting in the coops and full of rat shit.
They incubated eggs and the chicks died like flies because they didn't understand how coccidia works. Never mind, the horror of the place is way beyond my ability to explain.
So, get all that bile out. It is the Internet after all.
Then, if you want to be at all fair minded go and read some other posts I've made. read some of the stories I've written. Read some of my articles.If you can't manage that then
rant all you want. You have so little understanding of my situation here I can't even begin to take what you write seriously.