The Moonshiner's Leghorns

[Amer]

Those little birds dress out pretty nice! How older were they?

8 months I think. Except the biggest one was older. I couldn't evaluate them until I was sure they were mature.

Guess why people want birds in the spring versus fall? Because they don't want to take care of them over winter. People will bum the fire out of me for turkey poults and grown turkeys in the spring, but you can't sell anything in the fall. Because they don't want to have to feed them over winter when they aren't laying. I won't sell grown birds in the spring for that reason. If I can't sell the extras in the fall, we eat them.

The thing is they were grown pullets, laying, and she messaged me in February... When I just started hatching again. From the sisters of the very same pullets.

 

[KF0002]

Preach.
Someone same here but probably not as bad. I remember after Covid was in full swing Missouri made it easy to collect unemployment and tacked on like $500 a week extra.
My brother was bringing in $900 something a week and like many was whining about no jobs available. Well ya none for someone not looking and hanging at someone's lake house fishing everyday while I'm getting up at the @sscrack of dawn, working my butt off to clear half what you're getting.
They eventually cut the benefits but him and many drew it for 2 years.
We were raised by a single mom that never took help unless things got extremely desperate and she lost a job or transportation or something and then she'd go over the top to get back to not receiving it. Pissed me off at the time that my brother took the lazy route.
End rant.

Oh I could rant all day. I come from a long line of mooching, check-drawing, won't-strike-a-lick-at-nothing people. I descended from uneducated mountain people, who made a career out of having kids and drawing welfare, then raising your kid's kids (me and my brother), until you are old enough to draw your own check from the government. My mom was a drug addict who hardly ever worked and always lived off the government. She has finally gotten clean after her most recent stent in prison, and is finally working. My dad was an alcoholic and a drug addict and got murdered when I was about 2 for fooling around with another man's woman. Literally, I was the first person in my family to go to college, and one of the first to graduate high school. I vowed at a young age to break the family curse and make something of myself. Now, neuroses and childhood trauma aside, I am fairly normal-ish and I've worked since I was 14. Government assistance is a wonderful thing, as I was raised on it and am thankful we had it. But it shouldn't be a career. It is there to help you when you are down and out, not for life unless you are truly disabled.

 

[KF0002]

8 months I think. Except the biggest one was older. I couldn't evaluate them until I was sure they were mature.

The thing is they were grown pullets, laying, and she messaged me in February... When I just started hatching again. From the sisters of the very same pullets.

The only thing I can think if is that people get spring fever and want them in the spring, but are over it in the cold months. Once it starts warming up again in the spring, the fever hits again. That's like all these poor chicks, poults, ducklings, keets, etc. that TSC can't keep stocked. People buy them up impulsively without researching or any bit of preparation. Then they either perish or you see them being sold dirt cheap in the fall of the year because people realize it isn't much fun to take care of animals when its cold and muddy. People also think getting chickens is going to save them money on eggs. HA! I could laugh so hard I nearly bust a gut when they say that.

 

[Amer]

People also think getting chickens is going to save them money on eggs. HA! I could laugh so hard I nearly bust a gut when they say that.

Yeah, that's nonsense.
I'm thinking about when I do have my own place and incubator and have hatched more chicks than I know what to do with, I could sell the chicks for 10 dollars a piece. An internet search tells me that's how much they go for. I feel like I could make my d'Anvers pay their keep. They sure aren't good production birds in any way but they don't eat much and people will pay a lot for them.

 

[The Moonshiner]

Chick sells at the local farm store has really dropped off. Like most places around they were getting chicks once a week and selling out the first day.
The other day when I went in they had the shipment from this week but had some still left from last week. Their bins were full.
I don't know if the frenzy for eggs has changed. For some reason here even being rural people aren't keen on buying white eggs. People think only brown eggs are farm fresh eggs. I was always lucky if I could get a dollar a dozen for eggs and that was hardly worth the trouble when you figured in obtaining cartons. If you bought them that cut into profits considerably and if you found a way for free ones the time it took hardly made it worth it. I scored three trash bags full at an auction once for next to nothing. By then I was just putting eggs and a cooler at the end of my drive and letting people just stop and take them for free. When covid hit people wouldn't even take free eggs so I just quit even messing with it.
With the egg prices now just a while back I gave several to a friend for nothing. She took some to work and passed them out. She told me about it and asked if it was okay. I told her I didn't really care but I was out of cartons now so no free cartons. They had to bring their own and swap or bring a bag of box or something.
Now that I've been busier I haven't been keeping up on collecting a lot or making sure I had a lot of clean ones. I mostly just been tossing them to the dogs. She told me the other day she had people throwing a fit wanting eggs. Some had given her cartons and were mad because she still hasn't brought them eggs.
I told her I'm done with it. I'd give her eggs but screw all of them. I know what egg prices are and I'm not dealing with demanding people that expect free eggs and on their terms.

 

[KF0002]

My Brown Leghorn eggs from the other breeder are going into lockdown. He sent 12, 11 developed, and 11 are going into lockdown. I’m using the NR 360 because the two Genesis hatchers are full.

 

[KF0002]

Yeah, that's nonsense.
I'm thinking about when I do have my own place and incubator and have hatched more chicks than I know what to do with, I could sell the chicks for 10 dollars a piece. An internet search tells me that's how much they go for. I feel like I could make my d'Anvers pay their keep. They sure aren't good production birds in any way but they don't eat much and people will pay a lot for them.

We have thought about selling chicks, but we can’t compete with all of the $1 each chicks being sold by the chicken peddlers for “straight run” chicks. What they do is buy hatchery cockerel chicks and re-sell them as straight run. They may mix a few pullets in with them, but 10 to 1 you are getting roosters. And people buy them up like hot cakes. I have an inside source that says that is what one operation does.

 

[KF0002]

Chick sells at the local farm store has really dropped off. Like most places around they were getting chicks once a week and selling out the first day.
The other day when I went in they had the shipment from this week but had some still left from last week. Their bins were full.
I don't know if the frenzy for eggs has changed. For some reason here even being rural people aren't keen on buying white eggs. People think only brown eggs are farm fresh eggs. I was always lucky if I could get a dollar a dozen for eggs and that was hardly worth the trouble when you figured in obtaining cartons. If you bought them that cut into profits considerably and if you found a way for free ones the time it took hardly made it worth it. I scored three trash bags full at an auction once for next to nothing. By then I was just putting eggs and a cooler at the end of my drive and letting people just stop and take them for free. When covid hit people wouldn't even take free eggs so I just quit even messing with it.
With the egg prices now just a while back I gave several to a friend for nothing. She took some to work and passed them out. She told me about it and asked if it was okay. I told her I didn't really care but I was out of cartons now so no free cartons. They had to bring their own and swap or bring a bag of box or something.
Now that I've been busier I haven't been keeping up on collecting a lot or making sure I had a lot of clean ones. I mostly just been tossing them to the dogs. She told me the other day she had people throwing a fit wanting eggs. Some had given her cartons and were mad because she still hasn't brought them eggs.
I told her I'm done with it. I'd give her eggs but screw all of them. I know what egg prices are and I'm not dealing with demanding people that expect free eggs and on their terms.

We give a lot of eggs away to people in need and people will truly take advantage of it for real. I sell to people at my work and some will try to beat me out of paying so I quit bringing them eggs. My granny was asking me for eggs and I thought she was eating them so I dutifully took them to her. Well lo and behold she was giving them all away. So I quit taking eggs to her too. She was acting like she was eating them, and was giving them all to her pastor at church. I’m all about helping people but don’t lie to me.

 

[The Moonshiner]

Here's a pic of a blue rooster. Just took a few to see how they'd turn out in my pic box. Looks good to go after I add some chips or straw.
I had him in a pen of females so I really needed him moved so 3 weeks I can have all girls available for breeding pens. He was my 3rd in line blue male last year. Lol I swore he looked better then. Idk what happened with that tail angle. He's lacking a lot of tail feathers but I don't think when it's full it's gonna help enough. I'll keep him for now. My old blue started lacking fertility late last season and I lost my back up over the winter.
Gonna have to dig deep and see what choices I have. I've had an issue of red showing up in the shoulders so I won't use any with that although they are interesting looking.
I'll find one and take a pic tomorrow maybe. If I knew enough about them and how to maintain the red I'd work on a line of them.

 

[The Moonshiner]

I gotta work tomorrow and Saturdays are usually my worst days. If it doesn't stretch out too long I'll probably set up another group and then another Sunday.
Had an issue with my TB bringing the kid home from school. Went through some washboards on the gravel and picked up a rattle. Something loose that sounds like a tin can rattling under the front end. . Any of you all mechanics, cause I sure ain't.
Decided to just let it set for the weekend and drive the truck. I don't need a headache or bad news for a couple days.
Collected my first hatching eggs today. Probably see about setting the first 30 in the maticoopx then go from there.
I haven't even thought about which route to go with incubators or how many to try to set per week. Or maybe I'll go for every 10 days