How can I find my old pictures?

[Annabel]

I am awaiting an incubator from Brinsea (which after ordering it on 15th and having 3 dispatch dates cancelled, I believe is being dispatched tomorrow).  I have always wanted to hatch eggs (ever since it was done in my primary school) and my two primary school aged daughters are really excited to see the whole process and add them to our small flock.

However, I have been up until 1a.m many nights reading about what people do with the cockerels... I am someone that would find it very difficult to kill a male chick and would do everything I could to rehome it- has anyone had experience with this, is there next to no chance of success?

I have picked silkies for the children as they currently have only one chicken that likes to be held and so she gets far more attention than she probably would like and all of our chickens are large fowl so I thought silkies with their friendly nature, fluffy appearance (I know about the rain problem!) and small size would be perfect.  I am also hoping for a Marsbar to add green eggs to our egg basket.

So another question is - whether you think this is reasonable:

1) buying 2 silkie eggs and 2 Marsbar eggs  (through the post)

or whether my chance of ending up with a loan chick may be quite high and so perhaps:

2) 4 silkie eggs and 2 Marsbars might be better?

and finally my last thought was to try:

3) 6 silkie eggs and 3 Marsbars in the hope that I might be able to take the hens I want from the hatched and then rehome any roosters with hens to help them find homes (obviously I understand they could all be roosters but as soon as I have one rooster I have a similar problem in terms of hunting down a home as I would with a couple of roosters so I am hoping there may be spare hens to go with them).

It's just something I have always, always wanted to do but I am unable to send the cockerels to their death (I save flies from the pond and that sort of thing), and I also just think cockerels are such magnificent looking birds.

Help.... 

Also do you find that spare hens can be sold quite easily (or given away free) when we aren't official breeders but just a family who would like to fulfil our hatching adventure?  We are in Oxfordshire so hoping that might help.

[Cat tails]

Silkies are notoriously hard to sex, definitely early on. So be prepared to have the birds for months and they still turn out to be a cockerel. How would your kids cope with losing their cuddle friends then? 

No clue about how hard it is to rehome, as I’m not on your side of the pond. But over here it’s far from easy. I would also ask the breeder of the eggs what to do with cockerels. Maybe they offer to take them back?

[The Dogmother]

Ok, so I am in north Oxfordshire.

My response may not be popular with you, but I have been dealing with a lot of fall-out for these ventures just recently, so am advising caution and prudence; people have hatched chicks and are asking me "now what?".....

• Personally, I wouldn't recommend that anyone goes into hatching without first securing a home for any unwanted birds, males or not. It is virtually impossible to rehome unwanted cockerels and they usually end up getting dumped if the owner doesn't have the stomach to despatch them.
• Hatching in an incubator is much more time consuming than under a broody hen, plus you need to buy so much more equipment.
• Do you have a brooder, heat lamps and their eventual housing ready to go?

I can help if necessary, but any practical assistance is limited by distancing rules at the moment.

[Annabel]

Hi, Thank you for your advice.  I do have housing on order with the incubator, electric hen, chick feeders, sterilisation for the eggs etc- I looked into what I needed and placed an order for them altogether.

I have a friend who is a farmer's daughter and she also advised advertising the chicks now to test response if I insist upon rehoming them (she has explained the necessity of dispatching males in all categories of animals to me and has had to do it with calves, lambs etc).

I have also had long discussions with the children about the males saying I would try to rehome them but I can't guarantee I would be able to and so they may end up being killed as we can't keep them.  They are ok with this as desperate for the experience.

Thank you Dogmother for the offer of practical help.  I think if I ended up with cockerels I wouldn't be able to part with them if I knew they wouldn't live.  I think I'll have to think really hard on this today...

[Beantree]

Half your hatch will (statistically) be cockerels, but you can get luck either way. Our first hatch was 13 cockerels and one hen. Our second was 8 hens and 2 cockerels. By the 7th hatch it has averaged out so, we had 25 cockerels and 23 hens. As said, before you start have a solid plan and don't be surprised if nothing hatches or if they all hatch and are all male. Of our cockerels we kept 3 and sold two, which were the best of the hatches, the rest we ate.

Cockerels will start fighting from 12 weeks onwards and need to be separated, so plan for that.

Edited May 26, 2020 by Beantree
Addition

[Scalpay woman]

Please , don’t do it ! You know in your heart of hearts it’s just wrong bringing more animals into the world when already there are too many cockerels and not enough homes . What you will actually be teaching your children is to have absolutely no empathy for animals . . . To treat them as though they are a commodity to provide an experience , instead of sentient beings with a right to life . There is another way ! Go vegan instead and follow your conscience 

[The Dogmother]

Good to hear that you have a plan.

If you want to keep any makes, then you'll need at least 4 hens per cockerel. I wouldn't advise keeping a cock if you value any neighbours - someone a street away from me decided to keep a cock bird and some hens... they weren't secured so were always ravaging neighbours' gardens, and the cock waking them all up at 3.30am in the summer months, then crowing all day wasn't at all popular.  I got a call from a neighbour one day, and had to race back from work as this bloke had put the birds in a wheelie bin 'to die'. I rescued them all and took them to a friend's farm.

[Annabel]

Thank you for all of your advice and input.  I've decided to cancel my order and not hatch - very hard decision as I was so looking forward to it and as I am shielding, am in lockdown for a very long time so had plenty of time to turn the eggs, look after the chicks and so on- but the cockerels are the deal breaker for me.  I can't kill them or send them off to be dispatched so I guess for us, we will go to a breeder and pick girls old enough to be sexed.  

Thank you for helping me make this decision.

x

[The Dogmother]

That sounds like a good plan. If you are in Oxfordshire, then I can recommend John Beacham at Old Dairy Poultry in Wiggington. I just referred a friend who wants some newbies, and she was very complimentary about his birds, their welfare and his care of them. Cotswold Chickens in Kineton also has some birds in, but mainly hybrids at the moment. Both can do contactless purchases.

[Beantree]

All credit to you Annabel for thinking it through properly. Hatching and rearing can be a minefield, particularly if you have a mains power failure or breakdown. We had both and the amount of time (and equipment) it takes to deal with those problems doesn't bare thinking about. Dealing with cockerels certainly doesn't get any easier with experience; for us anyway. Whilst we have all the hatching, rearing and backup equipment for any conceivable eventuality, it hasn't been used for 5 years and may never be used again.

[Annabel]

3 hours ago, The Dogmother said:

That sounds like a good plan. If you are in Oxfordshire, then I can recommend John Beacham at Old Dairy Poultry in Wiggington. I just referred a friend who wants some newbies, and she was very complimentary about his birds, their welfare and his care of them. Cotswold Chickens in Kineton also has some birds in, but mainly hybrids at the moment. Both can do contactless purchases.

That is great thank you as I have just been looking- some of my chickens are from Domestic Fowl Trust near Stratford Upon Avon and they were lovely to visit but are almost out of stock with everything they sell - weird times in Lockdown!

 

29 minutes ago, Beantree said:

All credit to you Annabel for thinking it through properly. Hatching and rearing can be a minefield, particularly if you have a mains power failure or breakdown. We had both and the amount of time (and equipment) it takes to deal with those problems doesn't bare thinking about. Dealing with cockerels certainly doesn't get any easier with experience; for us anyway. Whilst we have all the hatching, rearing and backup equipment for any conceivable eventuality, it hasn't been used for 5 years and may never be used again.

Thank you Beantree.  I have been contacting breeders that have hens for sale - not many old enough to be sexed yet but I'm sure we will get out new additions and be sure to post pictures of the newcomers!

[Patricia W]

I’ve never hatched because I didn’t want the hassle of cockerels.  However, Sod’s Law intervened and  I have always kept a Cockerel because my first three included one who crowed at 5 months! We kept him, and he became Phillip, instead of Phillipa.   We have a set of lovely neighbours and the only time they complained was when Phillip died.  They missed hearing him they said.   So I adopted Phillip 2nd who was another wrongly sexed bird and lined up for the chop.   

All was well till Phillip’s ladies died of old age and he was still a sprightly 5 year old.  I found a wonderful organisation on FB called Red Rooster Rescue, and another HPG Rehome.   They work together and found Phillip a wonderful home in a National Trust property with 10 ladies.   As far as I know he’s still there in the lap of luxury, strutting his stuff! So I would recommend them if you ever did need to rehome.   

I then  restocked with Milly and Dilly.  Lo, and behold, Milly crowed!   I could have taken Milly, now known as Willy, bac,  but he’s very pretty so he’s still here.   I think I’m destined to have a Cockerel! 

[mullethunter]

That’s the right decision for you Annabel. I have hatched twice, and only got one hen. I’m just embarking on my third time, but having dispatched several poorly hens and one poorly young cockerel from my first hatch I do now know that although I find it very hard I can do it. And I know I can do it quickly and humanely. 

I will try to rehome any cockerels I hatch, and so far I have been lucky and been able to do this (to friends who have no near neighbours), but I am resigned to most likely having to cull this time.

[soapdragon]

Another Oxford based Omleteer! Whereabouts are you Annabel? There are a fair few of us here from Oxfordshire!

All credit to you, BTW, for thinking this through before embarking on the whole hatching thing then finding out that you had a load of boys to rehome or despatch.

 

[Luvachicken]

I was also thinking of the whole incubator process whilst not working in school and having plenty of time to do it, but decided against it.

Mostly for the reasons you have said about.

I have had chicks though from small and although you don't see the hatching process and the chicks growing, having ready sexed chicks is lovely - they still cheep, are quite small and love having cuddles. I would get chicks anytime over hatching my own, but maybe will one day I will hatch them when I live in a bigger space.