A century of Turkey talk 2000-2100.

[feedman77]

Fiesty...I agree with Feedman about Porters. If you've never been to his site you need to go check it out. I want one of each!

Feedman, 14 toms out of 15 ....yipes! Will you raise them all? What are you getting ready to hunt? I just bought little orange vests for my hens. Kidding...although they would look very chic in them.

Ralph sounds like the guineas have been pardoned. Out of jail & back to moma. Maybe she can keep them in line for awhile. Nice that your building them a deck!

Aurora...the most time I spend at my stove is to dust it. That's an amazing amount of canning.

I did rig a sort of lean-to thing in the turkeys coop and Daisy is using it! Annie still just drops an egg & keeps on walking.

gonna raise them til I figure out who I want for breeders will butcher the rest.

I picked uo 80 acres if ground trying to figure it out for deer season. Between that and work takes up most if my free time.

 

[feistychick]

I love the orange vest idea - I can just picture it! I worry about Turkules since he's a bronze, but I imagine he'd be pretty indignant if I put a vest or flag on him. Everyone is on limited free range time since the coyotes got so brazen, so I'm hoping no bonehead decides to shoot while I'm out there letting them have supervised run time.

Memphis - I'm glad that one of the ladies is using the lean-to area, Annie is just a spontaneous kind of girl.....

I have checked out Porter's turkeys, and that's when I started coveting "one of everything". I had hoped to order just a few, not a herd of them . I can see how this turkey thing could get out of hand..... I'll have one of these, and one of those, and that one looks cool, and I have to have one of that color - DH would freak!

 

[charmedbaker]

Hi Everyone!
Ralph, that is quite a list rap sheet. so they are on probation?

Orange safety vests are a great idea! Please post pictures if you do it!

I was gone for 4 days (family emergency so I didn't spend time online goofing off.)
My DH took care of the birds while I was away. When I went out there today, I know they were happy to see me.
They let me pet them, and hand feed them. Lots of clucking and chirps and gobbling. Also I got little eggs from at least one of my little girls! The old ones aren't laying now. Chacha is doing much better. The wound scabbed over and the scab came off. There is pink skin and new feathers growing in. She looks pretty rough, but almost better. I'll let her out in a few days. I want to be sure the others don't smell blood anymore and she is safe.

Aurora: Wow with the canning! I did one batch of pickles (24 jars) and it took me all day and I decided no more cucumbers in the garden!

Memphis: Sounds like your girls missed you and love you very much!

I'm looking forward to spring and surprising my DH with a turkey girl. Now I know how to hold it and see if it kicks to tell if its a girl or boy.
Crossing my fingers that litmus test works!

 

[Dragon Lady]

OMG Dragon Lady! Thanks so much for the molting turkey pic! We all need to have our naked turkey pictures ready for the molting picture contest! It's time a turkey won!! And Dragon Lady that's a great one!

haha, The poor thing dropped almost all of her feathers in one go. She was shivering so much too.
I gave her turkey starter as a warm mash each morning to help her out.

 

[mountain mom]

Oh the canning! I am taking a break today. I still have jalapenos, beets, carrots and I will have a billion more tomatoes. They took a small break, but I have a lot of green ones and new blossoms... I think there will be a few cases of green tomatoes in the garage later this fall.

The turkeys are sort of molting along with the chickens. A few downy type feathers here and there, nothing major though.
Dinner is getting so big I am afraid he may not fit in our oven...
AND, the other night he snuggled up next to me on the bench and begged some love. He hasn't done that for a while. His obnoxious teenager behavior seems to be wearing off a bit. He even let me pick him up to put him on his roost.
This is going to be hard! Not that the meat birds are easy, but I don't ever get so attached to them.

DH will be off hunting for a while. Luckily, he likes to hunt for the meat and time in the woods. Not for a binge week with the boys. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but it shouldn't involve guns and animals.

 

[feistychick]

Oh the canning!  I am taking a break today.  I still have jalapenos, beets, carrots and I will have a billion more tomatoes.  They took a small break, but I have a lot of green ones and new blossoms... I think there will be a few cases of green tomatoes in the garage later this fall.

The turkeys are sort of molting along with the chickens.  A few downy type feathers here and there, nothing major though. 
Dinner is getting so big I am afraid he may not fit in our oven...
AND, the other night he snuggled up next to me on the bench and begged some love.  He hasn't done that for a while.  His obnoxious teenager behavior seems to be wearing off a bit.  He even let me pick him up to put him on his roost. 
This is going to be hard!  Not that the meat birds are easy, but I don't ever get so attached to them. 

DH will be off hunting for a while.  Luckily, he likes to hunt for the meat and time in the woods.  Not for a binge week with the boys.  Not that there is anything wrong with that, but it shouldn't involve guns and animals.

You should post an updated picture of Dinner - he's a growing boy! He sounds like a sweet one

I am way too attached to mine now to even try raise them to eat (darned turkeys sneak up and make themselves pets). DH jokes about making any "extra" toms into Christmas dinner, and then rolls his eyes at me when I glare. I found someone near us who raises meat birds, so I think we'll get one of his for Thanksgiving lol. He has bourbon reds, so I might also try to get a hen or two from him if I need to balance out the boy/girl ratio.

 

[OneMountainAcres]

Oh the canning!  I am taking a break today.  I still have jalapenos, beets, carrots and I will have a billion more tomatoes.  They took a small break, but I have a lot of green ones and new blossoms... I think there will be a few cases of green tomatoes in the garage later this fall.

Argh, I can't wait to take a break! I just finished the carrots yesterday and the potatoes today and managed to do 7 quarts of applesauce tonight but it doesn't even look like I've put any kind of dent into the apples yet. It's exhausting! I'm just glad the apples are the last of the stuff laying around at the moment (and overly thankful to have a food strainer to help me this year).

In turkey news, I hung a light in their shed the other day since there's only one window and it doesn't really let much light in. That way if I can't let them out for a while, they don't have to sit around in the dark. Well, tonight I went out to turn off the light (I've been leaving it on in the evening for a bit) and half of them decided to fly up into the rafters and hang out on the loft up there. Serves me right for giving them extra light so they can see top explore I guess lol. Sweet Pea was even tucked in the middle of a roll of old fencing! Oh what brats!

I noticed the other day too that my two boys are starting to grow their beards They're just rough little bristles so far but it's still pretty neat, I think.

 

[memphis]

Hey Charmed....was wondering about Chacha. Glad she's recovering. I still can't get over the canning you all are doing! Honestly it's blowing me away.

MM, I'm like Feisty, I don't think I could do it. Geez that's going to be tough!

Wonder where Ralphie has been. You think those guineas retaliated and have him locked in the gulag?

It's starting to get dark so early now. Ugg! Don't mind winter....but sure hate the lack of daylight.

 

[mountain mom]

It really will be hard. Much harder than meat birds. I have decided he will be quarantined for a couple of weeks at the end, helping to fatten him up a bit and helping me to spend less time with him. It already makes me sad.

I have a feeling the guineas have Ralph hiding in one of his truck toppers with a gun, hoping for the best. The criminals have caused an uprising!

 

[duluthralphie]

Hey, My guineas are kind of being good, after I took out the gang leader. I have it on death row still. The other day it started screaming "buck wheat" so I found out the gang leader is a female, figures......


The others are being fairly well behaved, I have had offers for them, but I have refused to sell them now that they are being semi-good. I usually am over run with box elder bugs and those Asian beetles this time of year. With the guineas eating bugs, I have seen one this year. Which is a reason to keep the monsters.