Last week I talked about how I was planning on picking up a few new chicks. From last fall, we’ve lost 4 of our older birds (out of a flock of 34) and so we have a little wiggle room to get some more flock members this season.
I was planning on getting 2 chicks now and then adding 2 more birds over the summer.
Last summer, in order to get any chicks in New Hampshire, you had to buy at least 12. As the chick buying laws have changed – you can now buy chicks in any quantity – I went into our local Tractor Supply store ready to bring home 2 chicks.
“Can’t do that,” the clerk told me. “We sell chicks only in quantities of 6 and ducks in quantities of 2.”
I could respect that decision. In fact, I was okay with it and about ready to leave, when he added “It’s the New Hampshire law.”
Wait a minute. “No, it’s not,” I replied.
I know this for a fact, because I’ve been teaching about the new law since it was put into effect last July. I’ve even written articles for newspapers about the change in buying chicks.
Putting a minimum quantity on the amount of chicks you buy is *not* the New Hampshire law.
The clerk was confused. He made an attempt to “look up” the law in a notebook on the counter. Surprisingly (not) he couldn’t find any reference to it.
Needless to say, I left without any chicks.
When I got home, I called the main number for Tractor Supply Store. The nice woman on the phone told me that buying birds in a minimum quantity was a Tractor Supply Store policy put in place to ensure that the birds only went to “agriculturally minded households.” When I told her that that was fine, but that it wasn’t the law in New Hampshire, she asked if I wanted to be connected to Customer Service to make a complaint.
Not at all.
In fact I applaud, Tractor Supply’s attempt to protect the birds. I have long made public my concerns about the change New Hampshire made (I had visions of kids with a couple of dollars in their pocket buying a plaything for the afternoon.) And I think that having a lower minimum quantity purchase number is a good compromise (even though I was prepared to buy only 2 chicks) from a store that cares about what happens to it’s livestock.
Nope, no complaint from me, however, I do want Tractor Supply to recognize that they are operating under an individual store’s policy and they are not operating under the New Hampshire law.
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I just wrote a blog post for GRIT Magazine on how to pick out a healthy chick. Here’s the link- Chicks Are Not Puppies.
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I write about the lessons learned while raising children and chickens in New Hampshire. Contact me at [email protected]
Also, join me on Facebook to find out more about the flock (children and chickens) and see some pretty funny chicken jokes, photos of tiny houses, and even a recipe or two.
