A Chicken Story from Tractor Supply

[Josh L.]

So, at the beginning of this year, I finally got a new flock of hens after mourning the loss of my original flock of four black sex link hens. My current flock came in three separate sets of chicks from Ace Hardware and Tractor Supply, and the Tractor Supply in the town I was living in at the time of acquiring my current flock had a number of very nice heritage breeds among the common breeds. My first two rounds of chicks, I got with a friend of mine so we met the base requirement for 4 chicks/sale, and we each got two each time. First round was two black sex links(and two RIRs for my friend), then two barred rocks(And one easter egger and a red star). We ended up deciding a few months later that we were going to get another bunch of babies before the season was over and we would have to order them online, so we went back separately, each of us deciding to get four more. The original hens were nearly to the point of lay, but we had baby chicken fever. That is the curse of spring, after all.
Well, I went to TS on my own, in hopes of getting a pair of Lavender Orpingtons and Silver Laced Wyandottes. Now, i should have trusted my gut on the look of those baby chicks, but the worker there insisted that "No, THOSE are the orpingtons, and THESE HERE are the wyandottes." Neither group really resembled the chicks they were meant to be...
Regardless, I trusted the man running the TS Chick Cage, and ultimately was just happy to have more little babies to take care of, because, apparently, my life is incomplete without excessively needy, screaming baby animals all the time... which is why i have quail on the way now that the babies in this story are grown up; i really am a hopeless sap!
Back on topic, i was very hopeful about these beautiful little babies... until they began to feather out. Now, my goldies I'm still not sure WHAT they are, perhaps gold laced cochin, or cochin crosses, but i was 100% confident the other two were barred rocks-- which i was not thrilled about, because my older two barreds are THE WORST and they pick on everybody! (I should have just gotten four black sex links! Hind sight is 20/20, everyone.)
However, their combs have begun to come in more now, and theyve joined the rest of the flock, and the more i looked at them the more they looked rather different to my barred rock hens, and their personalities were so gentle in comparison. Upon doing some research, i discovered that, in fact, not only did TS mix up the chicks, but they gave me a pair of heritage chicks in place of some rather common (though sought after due to looks) chicks. I've been laughing about it all day, because every time i look at those babies i think about the guy at TS who probably ended up with dozens of calls from people saying "What the hell is this thing?? I asked for a (dominique/wyandotte/orpington/etc) and got a (NOT that chicken)!"
We have some STRONGLY breed specific people around here...

A funny note is my friend asked for four EE's and ended up with three and a gold laced Wyandotte. Not sure how that one happened! Oh, tractor supply, always surprising us!

Does anyone else have any wacky TS, or other ranch-supply type store, chicken stories? Or is my TS simply run by people who can't tell chicks apart?

 

[Quackwacker]

So, at the beginning of this year, I finally got a new flock of hens after mourning the loss of my original flock of four black sex link hens. My current flock came in three separate sets of chicks from Ace Hardware and Tractor Supply, and the Tractor Supply in the town I was living in at the time of acquiring my current flock had a number of very nice heritage breeds among the common breeds. My first two rounds of chicks, I got with a friend of mine so we met the base requirement for 4 chicks/sale, and we each got two each time. First round was two black sex links(and two RIRs for my friend), then two barred rocks(And one easter egger and a red star). We ended up deciding a few months later that we were going to get another bunch of babies before the season was over and we would have to order them online, so we went back separately, each of us deciding to get four more. The original hens were nearly to the point of lay, but we had baby chicken fever. That is the curse of spring, after all.
Well, I went to TS on my own, in hopes of getting a pair of Lavender Orpingtons and Silver Laced Wyandottes. Now, i should have trusted my gut on the look of those baby chicks, but the worker there insisted that "No, THOSE are the orpingtons, and THESE HERE are the wyandottes." Neither group really resembled the chicks they were meant to be...
Regardless, I trusted the man running the TS Chick Cage, and ultimately was just happy to have more little babies to take care of, because, apparently, my life is incomplete without excessively needy, screaming baby animals all the time... which is why i have quail on the way now that the babies in this story are grown up; i really am a hopeless sap!
Back on topic, i was very hopeful about these beautiful little babies... until they began to feather out. Now, my goldies I'm still not sure WHAT they are, perhaps gold laced cochin, or cochin crosses, but i was 100% confident the other two were barred rocks-- which i was not thrilled about, because my older two barreds are THE WORST and they pick on everybody! (I should have just gotten four black sex links! Hind sight is 20/20, everyone.)
However, their combs have begun to come in more now, and theyve joined the rest of the flock, and the more i looked at them the more they looked rather different to my barred rock hens, and their personalities were so gentle in comparison. Upon doing some research, i discovered that, in fact, not only did TS mix up the chicks, but they gave me a pair of heritage chicks in place of some rather common (though sought after due to looks) chicks. I've been laughing about it all day, because every time i look at those babies i think about the guy at TS who probably ended up with dozens of calls from people saying "What the hell is this thing?? I asked for a (dominique/wyandotte/orpington/etc) and got a (NOT that chicken)!"
We have some STRONGLY breed specific people around here...

A funny note is my friend asked for four EE's and ended up with three and a gold laced Wyandotte. Not sure how that one happened! Oh, tractor supply, always surprising us!

Does anyone else have any wacky TS, or other ranch-supply type store, chicken stories? Or is my TS simply run by people who can't tell chicks apart?

Same! We thought we were getting two golden comet hens. We ended up with a those island red and a red sex link.

 

[Josh L.]

Same! We thought we were getting two golden comet hens. We ended up with a those island red and a red sex link.

honestly, the boxes you get chicks in are LABELED! All they have to do is put them in the correct corresponding brooder bins and tag them properly! Ace sure doesn't seem to have any issue with it haha

 

[Quackwacker]

honestly, the boxes you get chicks in are LABELED! All they have to do is put them in the correct corresponding brooder bins and tag them properly! Ace sure doesn't seem to have any issue with it haha

Well I wondered when she started grabbing from the straight run bin when the brooder right in front was clearly labeled “golden comet”

 

[Josh L.]

Well I wondered when she started grabbing from the straight run bin when the brooder right in front was clearly labeled “golden comet”

there were a handful of tags on all the brooders in my shop, so i suppose it was anyone's guess, but they could not have picked chicks that looked LESS like the chicks they were supposed to be! i wonder how many of those breed purists in my area were cursing TS? Funny stuff- unfortunate, but funny!

 

[Secondof9]

My one experience at TS I got 2 polish bantams for myself and 2 silkies for my friend because of the 4 chick minimum sale. Both "silkies" turned out to be light Brahmas and the "polish bantams" were one Pyncheon bantam and one white silkie. At least my friend got one of what she wanted and my Pyncheon is a great little hen. But all 4 were identified incorrectly. Ah, well.

 

[GemmaGA]

So, at the beginning of this year, I finally got a new flock of hens after mourning the loss of my original flock of four black sex link hens. My current flock came in three separate sets of chicks from Ace Hardware and Tractor Supply, and the Tractor Supply in the town I was living in at the time of acquiring my current flock had a number of very nice heritage breeds among the common breeds. My first two rounds of chicks, I got with a friend of mine so we met the base requirement for 4 chicks/sale, and we each got two each time. First round was two black sex links(and two RIRs for my friend), then two barred rocks(And one easter egger and a red star). We ended up deciding a few months later that we were going to get another bunch of babies before the season was over and we would have to order them online, so we went back separately, each of us deciding to get four more. The original hens were nearly to the point of lay, but we had baby chicken fever. That is the curse of spring, after all.
Well, I went to TS on my own, in hopes of getting a pair of Lavender Orpingtons and Silver Laced Wyandottes. Now, i should have trusted my gut on the look of those baby chicks, but the worker there insisted that "No, THOSE are the orpingtons, and THESE HERE are the wyandottes." Neither group really resembled the chicks they were meant to be...
Regardless, I trusted the man running the TS Chick Cage, and ultimately was just happy to have more little babies to take care of, because, apparently, my life is incomplete without excessively needy, screaming baby animals all the time... which is why i have quail on the way now that the babies in this story are grown up; i really am a hopeless sap!
Back on topic, i was very hopeful about these beautiful little babies... until they began to feather out. Now, my goldies I'm still not sure WHAT they are, perhaps gold laced cochin, or cochin crosses, but i was 100% confident the other two were barred rocks-- which i was not thrilled about, because my older two barreds are THE WORST and they pick on everybody! (I should have just gotten four black sex links! Hind sight is 20/20, everyone.)
However, their combs have begun to come in more now, and theyve joined the rest of the flock, and the more i looked at them the more they looked rather different to my barred rock hens, and their personalities were so gentle in comparison. Upon doing some research, i discovered that, in fact, not only did TS mix up the chicks, but they gave me a pair of heritage chicks in place of some rather common (though sought after due to looks) chicks. I've been laughing about it all day, because every time i look at those babies i think about the guy at TS who probably ended up with dozens of calls from people saying "What the hell is this thing?? I asked for a (dominique/wyandotte/orpington/etc) and got a (NOT that chicken)!"
We have some STRONGLY breed specific people around here...

A funny note is my friend asked for four EE's and ended up with three and a gold laced Wyandotte. Not sure how that one happened! Oh, tractor supply, always surprising us!

Does anyone else have any wacky TS, or other ranch-supply type store, chicken stories? Or is my TS simply run by people who can't tell chicks apart?

Oh boy can I relate! Let me tell you a quick story about my TSC experience....

We got a total of 10 chicks from two different TSC stores back at the end of April. From one store, we got 4 'assorted bantam' chicks, straight run. For those, I knew it was a mixed bag, and pretty sure I ended up getting 3 cockerels and 1 pullet, but one of those cockerels died at about 9 weeks (RIP Bon Jovi - Gold Laced Polish):

what we got in the 'assorted bantam' bin:
2 GL Polish
1 Black Splash Cochin Bantam (roo)
1 Spangled OEGB (roo - worst chicken ever, he's such a butthead)

The other 6 chicks from another TSC store were supposed to be the following (all pullets):
2 Jersey Giants
2 Gold Laced Wyandottes
2 Silver Laced Wyandottes

What we think we actually got (all pullets, thankfully!):
1 Blue Jersey Giant
1 Black Australorp (she may be a JG, but she is about half the size of the blue JG we have, and I think her feet are the wrong color to be a JG)
2 GLW
2 Spangled Hamburgs (this was an interesting surprise, because I had no clue they even existed until i realized they were very much NOT Silver Laced Wyandottes)

Because this was our first set of chicks ever, we were none the wiser when we bought them and just took the word of the folks at TSC that they were what they were labeled. I love all my chickens (except maybe the OEGB, but trust me the feeling is mutual there.)

 

[Josh L.]

My one experience at TS I got 2 polish bantams for myself and 2 silkies for my friend because of the 4 chick minimum sale. Both "silkies" turned out to be light Brahmas and the "polish bantams" were one Pyncheon bantam and one white silkie. At least my friend got one of what she wanted and my Pyncheon is a great little hen. But all 4 were identified incorrectly. Ah, well.

Oh boy can I relate! Let me tell you a quick story about my TSC experience....

We got a total of 10 chicks from two different TSC stores back at the end of April. From one store, we got 4 'assorted bantam' chicks, straight run. For those, I knew it was a mixed bag, and pretty sure I ended up getting 3 cockerels and 1 pullet, but one of those cockerels died at about 9 weeks (RIP Bon Jovi - Gold Laced Polish):

what we got in the 'assorted bantam' bin:
2 GL Polish
1 Black Splash Cochin Bantam (roo)
1 Spangled OEGB (roo - worst chicken ever, he's such a butthead)

The other 6 chicks from another TSC store were supposed to be the following (all pullets):
2 Jersey Giants
2 Gold Laced Wyandottes
2 Silver Laced Wyandottes

What we think we actually got (all pullets, thankfully!):
1 Blue Jersey Giant
1 Black Australorp (she may be a JG, but she is about half the size of the blue JG we have, and I think her feet are the wrong color to be a JG)
2 GLW
2 Spangled Hamburgs (this was an interesting surprise, because I had no clue they even existed until i realized they were very much NOT Silver Laced Wyandottes)

Because this was our first set of chicks ever, we were none the wiser when we bought them and just took the word of the folks at TSC that they were what they were labeled. I love all my chickens (except maybe the OEGB, but trust me the feeling is mutual there.)

Tractor supply is wild, its good (or, maybe unfortunate? Lol) to know its not just my TS. What a mess haha

(In other news, I did get a very pretty ee cross roo recently, so it'll be interesting to see the cool babies I get from TS's mix up birds and him!)

 

[Sally PB]

I got the breeds I thought I was getting, and the pullets were pullets. But I think they spelled something wrong. "These are very probably all male" was spelled "straight run." Three out of three cockerels. Had to cull two this last summer when hormones kicked in. Never buying straight run again!

 

[Jabebee13]

Okay. Not a tractor supply... TS but a local farm store... I don't know the name of the place. It is not either ace hardware. I got barred rocks chicks and one grew up to be a golden laced Wyandotte. I named her Lakeisha. She wanted to be a mom. It hasn't happened. Not with me. My old boyfriend gave her away. Edit the place is Paul's Farm & Garden (years ago)