Best Hatcheries to Buy Lavender Orpington Chickens

Lavender Orpington Chickens are a beautiful chicken whose charcoal or light grey feathering is distinguished and mesmerizing. In the right light, these fluffy birds can even appear every bit as purple as their name implies.

They are a relatively new variety of chicken, which is excellent news for individuals or families wanting something new and hip! Indeed, if chickens were fashion icons – and who is to say that they are not? – they would carry the same weight as Vuitton, Versace, and Karan. Such are the designer stylings of these cute, floofy fowl.

Of course, being a designer breed could come with problems. Does this title come from their overall rarity? Or is it just symptomatic of how they were created?

This article will delve into some of the best places to get these amazing birds and we’ll look at just how rare a designer breed they are. We will also consider whether or not they cost more for their status.

Now that we’ve given a rough breakdown on why you might want to add these birds to your home coops, it’s time to consider where you can get these wonderful birds!

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What Are Lavender Orpingtons?

Lavender Orpignton chickens are friendly, beautiful, and fluffy birds with unique silver-blue feathers. They only grow to about eight pounds at their largest, but these dual-purpose chickens aren’t usually raised for the dinner table, anyway.

Most often raised for eggs, Lavender Orpingtons are reliable egg producers who start laying at around six months of age. They tend to produce three or four medium- to large-sized pale brown eggs each week. Docile and great with children, these birds also make wonderful pets.

Members of the I Love Backyard Chickens Facebook group have these sorts of things to say about their Lavender Orpingtons:

They are friendly and love to forage (we have an acre). My lavender roo is my favorite Roo I have. Least desirable thing is that they aren’t the best layers but still decent. I always recommend Orpingtons! Lovely breed.
Heidi Horak

10 Best Hatcheries to Buy Lavender Orpington Chickens

1. Meyer Hatchery

Average Straight-Run Lavender Orpington Chicken Price: $19.83

Meyer Hatchery is based in Polk, Ohio, and boasts itself as the “premier Poultry Source.” Priding itself on customer service and availability, Meyer Hatchery provides a variety of chicken breeds to meet customer demands for color and diversity. They welcome mixing and matching of breeds of the same poultry type to meet minimum order requirement for safe shipping. To help with orders, they have a calendar of hatchings.

Meyer has a variety of means of communication, including multiple phone numbers, fax, and email. They also run a blog that covers everything from breeds to plant pairing with chickens, feed, cooking recipes, fowl entertainment, and survival tips. They have an abundance of breeds available for sale, including the much-coveted Lavender Orpingtons.

And if you’re looking for another great resource when it comes to feeding your new Lavender Orpingtons, be sure to pick up some of this chick starter. It’s loaded with all the nutrients your birds need to get off on the right foot!

Advantages

Website is up-to-date in real time.
Accepts checks and credit cards
Guarantees gender of chicks either through refund or store credit.
Optional vaccination.
Member of the National Poultry Improvement Plan (NPIP), and provide NPIP VS Form 9-3 free of charge.
Offer orders of over 100 chicks.

Disadvantages

Limited store hours that change with the season.

2. Cackle Hatchery

Lavender Orpington Female Chicks Price: $12.95

Cackle Hatchery proudly boasts that they have been hatching and shipping since 1936. A third-generation hatchery based in Missouri, their mission is to provide customers with quality poultry for showing, meat, enjoyment, and eggs. They ship throughout the USA, including Alaska, Puerto Rico, and Hawaii. They offer nearly 200 different types of chickens at all stages.

Cackle also offers many other kinds of poultry including ducks, water fowl, game birds, turkeys, and other fowl. They are also a good source for supplies and book. Lavender Orpingtons are available only as baby chicks, and they are a very seasonal bird, available only early March through July.

Advantages

Discounts if you buy male chicks
Vaccinations available
Only need 3 birds to ship (or just one for male birds)

Disadvantages

Limited availability (February through September)
Sold as baby chicks only.

3. Hoover’s Hatchery

Unsexed Lavender Orpington Chick Price: $7.45

Hoover’s Hatchery is a massive poultry production hatchery located in Rudd, IA. Hoover’s supplies many farm and garden supply stores in the United States with their chicks, making them a smart choice if you want to skip the middleman and order from the hatchery directly.

Plus, Hoover’s offers free shipping on practically everything you order. You’ll have to buy at least 15 chicks; so Hoover’s might not be the best option if you live in a city with chicken restrictions. However, as long as you’re willing to buy in bulk, it’s a smart choice. You can even mix and match your order by adding other birds of other chicken breeds along with poultry species like pheasants, turkeys, guineas, ducks, and more.

Lavender Orpington chicks are out of stock until mid-September 2020.

Advantages:

Excellent guarantee and refund policy in case of shipping problems
Hatches chicks during the winter, one of the few hatcheries to do so
Discounts on increased orders up to 25+.

Disadvantages:

Large minimum order (15 to 20 depending on size)

4. My Pet Chicken

Average Straight-Run Lavender Orpington Chicken Price: $19.85

My Pet Chicken got started in 2005 by Traci Torres and her husband, Derek Sasaki, two novices to the chicken world who had a dream to help other novices in their farmers’ goals. To do this, the put free how-to information on the web and offered some unique products and services.

The website launched in 2005 and in 2006, their flock had grown to the point to where they started offering chicks for sale from their headquarters in Monroe, CT. The site has been mentioned in another of publications, and serves tens of millions of page views per year. Lavender Orpingtons have limited availability and the website should be consulted for the next available batch.

Advantages

Offers Marek’s vaccinations on all standard chicks at the click of a button.
Consistent hours of operation.
A good source for questions about ordering chickens, chicken care, and about raising chickens.
Full refund for any bird that has been incorrectly sexed.

Disadvantages

Limited availability.
Does not have a storefront
Offers only Day-Old Lavender Orpington Chicks

5. Purely Poultry

Not Sexed Day-Old Lavender Orpington Chicken Price: $22.99

As a family-owned business, Purely Poultry has some of the best customer service around. They pride themselves on their knowledge of their products, selection, and how-to details related to everything they offer, including ducks, chickens, geese, and lots of other birds!

Located in Durand, WI, they guarantee live birds with every order, which is a good promise, indeed! Lavender Orpingtons are in high demand, thanks in part to their fluffiness.

Advantages:

Each order backed by live arrival guarantee
Small order minimum on chicks
Other kinds of poultry offered, too

Disadvantages:

Not a huge advantage to buying multiple chicks – discounts are minimal
Expensive, especially for females. $4.50 extra on top of the Not Sexed rate.

6. Northwoods Poultry

Average Straight Run Old lavender Orpington Chicks – $10.00 each

After leaving a life of Nine to Five, Charmaine and Jeff headed out into the countryside of Florence, WI to start a life of horses, chickens and trees. In the nine years since, they have built up a happy home supported by their chicken habit. They have made a point to select among some of the rarest and unusual chicken breeds to accommodate the demands of all manner of chicken enthusiast.

Northwoods selected their Lavender Orpingtons from the Kink-JC blood line.

They’re also prized for their egg-laying abilities, but if you’re having trouble getting your birds to lay, it might be time for a coop revamp. Tidy things up and then add some of these beautifully-scented nesting herbs to reboot your girls’ laying routines.

Advantages

Very affordable
All chicks are sold as a straight run
48 hour live chick guarantee
Offers Marek’s Vaccine to order
Mixing and matching is possible

Disadvantages

Expensive shipping
Requires orders of 15 or more.

7. Chickens for Backyards

Average Straight-Run Lavender Orpington Chicken Price: $7.15

Chickens for Backyards is an online poultry store that ships orders from Phillipsburg, MO. It sells over 100 breeds of day-old chicks, ducks, geese, turkeys, and guineas with orders as low as three fowl. They have a mix and match option for all breeds, which can be shipped all in the same order.

Shipping schedules run from February through October. On their website, they offer a comprehensive FAQ page and Chick Care information. On the Lavender Orpington product page, there is a breakdown of the bird and information on the live chick guarantee.

Advantages

Orders can be cancelled up to 24 hours before shipping.
Free shipping on supplies.
Comprehensive FAQ that covers a range of questions from care, feed, shipping, sexing, local laws relating to chicken farming, and terms.

Disadvantages

Offer a 90% sexing guarantee, and will refund 90% of the purchase price once the 90% guarantee is surpassed.
Limited availability

8. The Chick Hatchery.com

Average Straight Run Lavender Orpington Chicken Price – $7.50

The Chick hatchery is Michigan’s “premier source for superior quality poultry.” With a creed that revolves around the sharing and joy of raising chickens, they operate in no-kill facilities. They raise their chickens humanely, with any unsold chicks going to Amish farms. Much of the experience of raising chickens is the awareness of the individual chicken and the relationship between food and our own health.

Their Lavender Orpington Chickens are available from February through August.

Advantages

Ships a minimum of 3 of each sex
All poultry guaranteed live delivery
Offers discounts on orders of larger quantities of birds*

Disadvantages

Ships a maximum of 15 total chicks (the above discounts do not apply to Lavender Orpingtons, due to their product limitations)
Does not ship to Hawaii or outside the USA

9. Murray McMurray Hatchery

Average Unsexed Lavender Orpington Chicken Price: $6.08

Murray McMurray started his chicken business in 1917. As a banker, he sold his chicks to locals through the bank and by 1919, he had developed his own stock of chickens. During the Great Depression, he devoted himself to chickens full time. Since then, Murray McMurray Hatchery has developed into one of the largest chick hatcheries in the country. They sell more than just chickens, with ducks, geese, guineas, turkeys, other fowl and game birds all in the catalogue.

They take great pride in the Lavender Orpingtons that they produce, and are big fans of them.

Advantages:

Very affordable
Bulk discounts available
Excellent breed availability with clear Availability chart
Mixing and matching chick breeds is possible

Disadvantages:

Minimum order of six birds at a time

10. Papa’s Poultry

Average Lavender Orpington Chicken Price – $20.00

Papa’s Poultry is a family owned business located in Redding, CA. They got started in finding, gathering, and sustaining rare and heritage breed poultry in 2010. Despite some setbacks and family member that would “tolerate” the business, it has become a flourishing business that loves catering to other chicken lovers.

Papa’s has taken a liking to Orpington chickens, and runs a range of them, including Lavender Chicks. These pretty chicks are available for pre-order and ship within weeks or months. Curious customers can contact them for shipping inquiries.

Advantages

24-48 hour response time.
Ships to California.
Minimum orders of 6 chicks, shipped Monday-Wednesday.
Guarantees provided for live as well as “weak upon delivery.”

Disadvantages

Relatively expensive.
Minimum orders of 6 chicks.

While Lavender Orpingtons are a designer breed, they are quite available for purchase in a number of locations throughout the USA. They are a generally affordable chicken, but some hatcheries are exceptions to the rule.

Lavender Orpingtons: The Fluffy Friend You Need to Be Raising!

Not raising these brown egg layers yet? Why not? Whether you decide to raise these chickens from pullets or baby chicks, you’ll love what they have to offer. They’re great for pets, prized for their beautiful feathers and abilities as free range egg layers.

Put them at the top of your priority list as you order egg layers this month – the unusual plumage color alone is worth the purchase.

Maat van Uitert

Maat van Uitert is a backyard chicken and sustainable living expert. She is also the author of Chickens: Naturally Raising A Sustainable Flock, which was a best seller in it’s Amazon category. Maat has been featured on NBC, CBS, AOL Finance, Community Chickens, the Huffington Post, Chickens magazine, Backyard Poultry, and Countryside Magazine. She lives on her farm in Southeast Missouri with her husband, two children, and about a million chickens and ducks. You can follow Maat on Facebook here and Instagram here.

What Are Lavender Orpingtons?