My Tom Attacked Me Today.

I have three bourbon red turkeys, one male and two females, about a year old and today my tom just decided to attack me. I was wearing an American sweat shirt with red white and blue. Having heard that these colors are known to tick off toms, I decided to go back inside and put on a camoflouge jacket instead. I went back outside, and he was back to his normal strutting around harmlessly. Well I went out again later that day, wearing the camo jacket, and he ran up to me and smashed me with his wings and feet again. I gave him a swift kick to the butt a few times and guided him into the coop for the night before he could get at me again. We just recently butchered the smaller, less dominant tom. He got beat up quite a bit. Do you think that he's just trying to fight his way up the social ladder? I've read that you can grab them by the neck, push down and back, and guide them around for a while. Does this work? I know that you should never ever show submission, but he didnt seem to ever want to stop coming at me. Any other meathods to stop this aggression before it gets any worse, OTHER THAN KILLING HIM?

This was the last one to attack me.

eggbert420 said:

This was the last one to attack me.

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LOL - good one!

Turkeys are pretty single minded. Once they get an idea in their head it can be hard to change. Next time butcher the aggressive one and keep the quieter one. Do you have hens for him? I personally would butcher too and try again. Turkeys are much too big and strong to try to dominate.

Unfortunately, turkeys or any other animal for that matter, don't see us as same-species beings, just weird bipedal things that sometimes feed them. Because of this, you can't 'put them in their place' or otherwise communicate with them as they do with each other. It comes down to carefully selecting for the temperament that you want and culling the rest.