Yes, it’s true. There is such a thing as chicken math, and I have completely fallen victim to it. 😉
I can’t say enough how much we loooooooooooovvvvvvvvveeeeeeeeee ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ our chicks!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
By Friday, Hunny had decided thy weren’t as dumb as he thought they would be, and was carrying them around the house. He also agreed that getting a few more wouldn’t be a big deal. 😆 Since I had only gotten 1 Barred Rock (BR) (Rocky) and 1 Buff Orpington (BO) (Butternut) and thought they were awesome, the initial plan was to get 1 more of each.
But then I got to thinking (and this is where the chicken math kicks in 😀 ), that K had gotten a Producing Red (which is an mix, as I understand it, between a Rhode Island Red and a New Hampshire Red) and it was cute and friendly. So now I want one, too. 😆
Since the red lays brown eggs and is a higher egg producing hen than my Easter Eggers (EEs) (which lay blue/green varitey eggs), combined with my BR and BO, who will also both lay brown eggs and are higher producing egg laying birds, I figured I should also get another EE to balance things out. 😆 (EEs are the hatchery version of the Ameraucanas. When doing research, it seems that if it comes from a hatchery, it is an EE, but is wrongly tagged as the Ameraucanas. While it carries the blue egg gene, it is not true to the breed. Knowlegeable chicken folks will tell you that if you want *real* Ameraucanas, which are rare, you need to find an approved breeder.)
Down to the livestock store I went, getting there bright and early by 7 am, hoping they had some left. Well, shucks, they had sold out all 1,5000 chicks by 2 pm Friday, the first day the sale “officially” started. “You can order them,” I was told. Because there were others ordering as well, it was not a problem for me to have a total order of 4 chicks; 1 of each different breed. Yippee!!
Now, if you have researched getting chicks, you will know that hatcheries have a minimum order (mostly because chicks need to stay warm during shipping, although there are some that will ship lower numbers but charge you significantly more). Tractor Supply (TSC) has a minimum order of 25 chicks total, although you can mix breeds in increments of 5.
To bring them home from TSC, I would need to get 6. I had been to my local TSC on Thursday, and they had some chicks. Problem was, they only had a straight run (which means boys and girls) and they had no idea what was in the tank. Interestingly, both TSC and the livestock and feed store get their chicks from the same hatchery. Why one place knows what they are getting and the other one doesn’t is a mystery to me.
But I digress. 🙂
So, ordering from the feed store made sense to me. My question was, what kind of time frame are we looking at? When I had gone online at the hatchery early in the season, everything I wanted wasn’t going to be available until May at the earliest, and since I hadn’t ordered then, it seemed to me (without checking, of course) that a new order would be even later in the season.
This would mean that I would have two set of chicks that were very different ages, which would necessitate a second brooder and worries about integrating “flocks.” After talking to the folks at the store, though, they seemed pretty certain that they would get all the other ordered chicks in about two weeks, based on years past. I couldn’t help myself, and took the plunge. 😆
Now that a few days have passed, I figure, even if it takes longer for them to get here, I would not be too worried about getting set up for another brooder. Given the way this batch of chicks has grown, I am not too sure that it will last them until they are ready to be outside, so chances are good that we’ll need to make them something bigger anyhow. And if that happens, I’ll have an empty smaller brooder, perfect for baby chicks.
See! It all works out! Chicken math is something that folks going into chickens need to be aware of. 😉 My hope is that I don’t end up with roos, because I’m pretty sure that would be a problem.
There is nothing like hearing the cheep cheep cheeping from my girlies. I also think there is nothing quite as fascinating as chick tv, either. On the second day, they were trying to fly, and it is crazy how fast their wings grow!! By the time I had them for a day, they were trying to perch. Even though the perch wasn’t that high, there was much falling off, and limbo practice going on. As you can see in the pictures below, roosting has been conquered, although they don’t do this at night yet. Lately, there has been much bickering and shoving to get the “sweet spot” on the perch. 😆
♥♥♥ my chicks!!!
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