Methodology
What this site measures, and how.
Chick Price Index tracks the published price and availability of day-old chicks at major US hatcheries, by breed and by sex. A collector visits each hatchery's public catalog once a day (twice daily during the January–June hatching season), records every live-poultry listing, and normalizes breed names so the same breed can be compared across hatcheries.
Tracked hatcheries
| Hatchery | Location |
|---|---|
| Cackle Hatchery | Missouri |
| Murray McMurray Hatchery | Iowa |
| Meyer Hatchery | Ohio |
| Townline Hatchery | Michigan |
| Sunnyside Hatchery | Wisconsin |
| My Pet Chicken | online retailer |
What the fields mean
- Pullet — sexed female chick. Costs the most; most buyers want hens for eggs.
- Cockerel — sexed male chick. Cheapest.
- Straight run — unsexed, as hatched (~50/50).
- In stock / Sold out — the hatchery's own published availability at collection time.
- Call hatchery — the hatchery publishes prices but not live stock; availability is unconfirmed by design rather than guessed.
- Next hatch — the earliest available hatch/ship date the hatchery publishes, where available.
Collection principles
- Only public pages, read at most twice a day with an identified user agent — a small fraction of one human visitor's traffic.
- robots.txt is checked and honored on every run; pages a hatchery disallows are not collected.
- Prices are recorded exactly as published. No estimates, no interpolation; when a hatchery doesn't publish availability, we say so.
- Median prices exclude sold-out listings when in-stock listings exist.
Frequently asked questions
Where does the price data come from?
From the public catalogs and availability pages of the tracked hatcheries. A collector reads each hatchery's public listings once or twice a day and records price, sex, and availability for every breed.
How fresh are the prices?
Listings are collected daily (twice daily during the January–June peak season). The current dataset was last updated 2026-07-14. Always confirm final price and availability with the hatchery — minimum order quantities, vaccination options, and shipping are not included.
What does 'straight run' mean?
Straight run chicks are unsexed — sold as hatched, roughly 50/50 male and female. Pullets are sexed females (priced highest), cockerels are sexed males (priced lowest).
Why does one hatchery say 'Call hatchery' instead of in stock or sold out?
Some hatcheries publish prices but take orders by phone without live online stock. We show their prices and mark availability as unconfirmed rather than guessing.
Are you affiliated with the hatcheries?
No. Prices are collected from public pages for comparison. Links go directly to the hatchery's own product pages.
Questions, corrections, or a hatchery that should be added? A contact address is coming soon.