We then decided we'd like to add to the flock and found that Point-of-Lay chooks aren't easy to come by this time of year... and ex battery hens are like gold dust (unless you've had your name on a list for some months)
Trawling the internet and magazines is one way of finding breeders but make sure you phone and ask if you can see the pens / chickens before driving some distance only to find (like us) that entrance is barred and the bedragled smelly, scared little pullets of undetermined age are brought to the garden gate in a cat carrier.. (The web site by the way looked very professional)..
The next day we found another breeder, spoke on the phone and were told that we would of course be more than welcome to see the pens and chickens before purchase..
Another hours drive but worth every minute.. what a lovely place , clean healthy shiny chickens, in clean grassed pens, not overstocked and a very helpful knowledgeable breeder who was only too pleased to show us everything and answer any questions we had..
He had heard of the 'other' breeder through several disapointed people all with the same story.. we had in fact been sold a 'French copper maran' which definately wasnt!! I didnt know they had hairy legs from birth!!
Anyway this is just a warning to any other eager chook purchasers.. DONT be too eager, there are apperently a lot of disreputable breeders out there.. :(
