Frequently Asked Questions

Unfortunately, no! Chicks are usually shipped on Monday unless there is a Federal Holiday. Then they are shipped on Tuesdays. Smaller orders of 3-14 chicks automatically ship USPS Express Mail, and larger orders of 15 chicks or more are shipped via Priority Mail service. Why can't I get my chicks shipped on a different day of the week? The short answer is that chicks wouldn't survive.The long answer: Right before the babies hatch, they absorb their yolk sac, which sustains them with hydration and energy for their journey to you. But the yolk sac only provides about 2-3 days' worth...

Right before chicks hatch, they have just absorbed the last of the yolk. This sustains them during their journey, for up to three days, so that's why they need to ship at that time, when the yolk will sustain them. The reason nature works this way is that if they were hatching beneath a mother hen, this would enable the early hatchers to survive without eating and drinking until mother finished hatching the rest of the eggs. She can't get up from the nest until the entire hatching is over, or else the last babies would die in their shells,...

Our chicks are hatched in the wee hours on Monday* of each week during the hatching season, and they're sorted, sexed, vaccinated, packaged, and shipped either Monday or Tuesday. (*Except when a holiday falls on a Monday, in which case they're hatched on a Tuesday.)

Especially with our fertile hatching eggs, we have some great lines that produce amazing show prospects. Ours is an NPIP hatchery and our birds are purebred. (The exceptions are designer hybrids, Easter Eggers, and the Red Stars which are a hybrid "mixed breeds" by nature.) Other breeds are pure, but don't have APA standards yet: take, for instance, breeders working to develop APA standards for Svarthonna and some other breeds that are rare to this country. But regardless, in all cases where APA standards exist, our birds are selected to conform to them, and they're selected as well for health...

Not usually, but let us explain why. Humans do not catch Salmonella from chicks or chickens the way you would catch a cold from your neighbor. Salmonellosis is food poisoning; you get it from eating infected meat or eggs. Even then, in order to get a case of Salmonella, the meat and eggs you have eaten must be improperly prepared, that is, not completely cooked through. Or, you can also get Salmonella by getting your hands or something else contaminated with feces and then putting that thing in your mouth. People more at risk for contracting Salmonella are very young,...

Coccidiosis is an infection caused by a protozoan, and it is found in most environments. However, the coccidiosis vaccine administered in the U.S. is unattenuated, meaning it is not weakened in any way, and can actually cause illness and retarded growth. We think it's a bad idea to cause the baby chicks to endure the extra stress of cocci vaccinations, since shipping is already stressful on the babies. It's for that reason we don't offer a vaccination against coccidia. To offer extra protection against cocci, you can offer a medicated chick starter feed--this usually contains amprol, and helps chicks resist...

"Certified organic" regulations vary from state to state and region to region, and (thus far) do not have to do with the way chicks are hatched. Instead, whether eggs you produce on your farm or in your backyard can be certified "organic" or not has to do with the way YOU raise the chickens you acquire. Generally you will have to feed an organic feed, but it is much more than that and can include whether you medicate them, with what, and sometimes even whether the land you raise them on has been certified free of pesticide use for a...

It's always disappointing when a bird isn't sexed correctly, especially if your "girl" ended up being a "boy" and was the family's favorite chick! Since chicken sexing is an art, not a science, sometimes errors do occur (though our professional chick vent sexers are correct more than 90% of the time). 1. We will refund you for any bird which has been incorrectly sexed, provided you notify us within the correct sexing error reporting time frame. Early or late reports can't be taken. Sexing errors must be reported when the birds are 14 to 22 weeks old. Sexing errors for...