How to avoid getting scammed when buying chickens online.
Facebook is a great place to find local breeders. Unfortunately not everyone posting birds for sale in Facebook groups are legitimate. Facebook is, sadly, full of people trying to sell birds that don’t exist and it’s worth knowing how to spot them before you send anyone money.
The TL/DR (aka: short) version…
• NEVER send money to someone you don’t know for chickens you haven’t seen.
• People offering to ship live birds in Nova Scotia are up to something.
• Be cautious of page names like “[Name] Backyard Chickens” or “[Name] Chicken Farm”.
• If they ask for your location before sharing theirs, that’s a red flag.
• Search their name and ask around before you buy.
Shipping is a red flag.
I don’t know of any legitimate farm in Nova Scotia that ships live birds. Hatching eggs, sure. Live chickens, ducks, or geese, no. If someone offers to ship birds to you, that’s reason enough to walk away.
Some legitimate sellers will deliver or meet you halfway, which is a kind thing for them to offer. However, if the only option for you to get birds from a breeder is to have them ship the birds or deliver them to you while you pay upfront, I would look elsewhere – that’s a MAJOR red flag.
Scammers will often comment on your “in search of” posts.
Legitimate breeders are obviously going to comment if they have what you’re looking for. Other chicken people will make recommendations as well. Unfortunately, it’s also common for scammers to search for anyone mentioning that they’re looking for chickens so that they can target them. They will comment on your post asking you to PM them (because they don’t want to be doing any shady business where someone else can see them). Sometimes they will have a seemingly innocent group member comment something like “Check out [insert farm name]” to direct you to contact the scammer.
When you do PM them, they will have absolutely everything you ask for. You want ten Black Copper Marans hens that are going to start laying tomorrow? Sure thing! Half a dozen of those fancy rainbow colored “Unicorn” hens that no one has ever heard of because they don’t exist? Guess what? They’ll have those too and they can ship them to you tomorrow. How convenient!
It is important to note that, since Facebook does not allow selling animals, some actual breeders will ask you to PM them to discuss pricing. This isn’t to try to hide anything, it’s because Facebook could shut their page down if they’re caught selling birds. Not everyone who wants to talk privately is a scammer but, when combined with these other things, it can be a tip-off.
Pay attention to their Facebook page name.
A lot of scam pages follow a pattern: [Name] Chicken Farm or [Name] Backyard Chickens, where the name is someone’s first name, not pluralized (think Thomas Backyard Chickens or Linda Chicken Farm). These pages also tend to have improper capitalization in the names.
They want your location before they’ll give theirs.
This one comes up a lot. A scammer will often ask where you’re located before they’re willing to say where they are so they can choose a location that is close to you when they lie about where they are. A real seller usually has no problem telling you (at least roughly) where their farm is, since that’s part of what makes them trustworthy in the first place.
NEVER send money to someone you don’t know for chickens you haven’t seen.
If you don’t personally know the seller, don’t send money ahead of time. This is the single easiest way scammers take money from people, and it works because the birds sound too good to pass up and nobody wants to lose out by waiting.
E-transfers, in particular, are not reversible. Once that money is sent, it’s gone.
Do a little digging.
Search the seller’s name and their page name. If they’re a real farm, even if they’re a newer one, you’ll usually find other posts from them or about them. This might be old posts, comments from other buyers, or mentions in local groups. If there’s nothing there at all, or if they’ve posted the same post advertising the same chickens for sale all over North America, that’s worth noticing.
On Facebook you can check the page itself to see what country the page owner is from (among other information). Go to the page in question, click their name at the top of the page and, when a box pops up, click “Transparency & Privacy Policy”. These instructions work at the time of writing this but Facebook likes to change things so they may not work in the future.
Ask your chicken friends or post in a local chicken group.
If you’re in doubt, please ask someone local who you know keeps or sells chickens, ducks, geese, etc. if they’ve ever heard of the person before you buy. You’re ALWAYS welcome to message and ask me if you’d like. Poultry people know each other and, if they exist as a legit farm, someone will know them – even if they’re new.
