The open end is facing East, the back wall is facing North. Both other walls are bordered by the other 3 rooms.
I did a google search on measuring turkeys. Almost all of the info was about length of the beard or weight OR oven size and how tall the average Turkish human male is.
I have an old shed that is approximately 60 years old, but it has (technically) 4 rooms or rather 3 rooms and a lean-to. 1 room is about 20 x 14, another is about 14 x 14, the little room is about 5 x 10 and the lean-to is approximately 12 x 12. All rooms have regular sized door openings.
As an added bonus, almost every wall is a double wall. That is, the inside boards are horizontal, while the outside boards are vertical. It has a tin roof with open spaces where the walls and roof meet. Two rooms have a window and I am debating on putting a big window in the largest room. I haven't done so yet as I just hate to mess up the double walls.
After reading on here (and someone can correct me if I am wrong), if I use the lean-to as my winter turkey home, they will enjoy the open end that will be enclosed by wire fencing. The open end will be approximately 8 foot tall x 10 foot wide and covered.
Since I am in Western Maryland, we "usually" have pretty intense winter weather. That did not happen this last winter, but I expect it will be more normal this year.
Is there anything wrong with this idea?
Sun will warm the water as well as soil and it will help on those really freezing days.The open end is facing East, the back wall is facing North. Both other walls are bordered by the other 3 rooms.
What are the black barrels of water for? I can cover the roof and both open sides in greenhouse plastic or (just thinking) putting a couple of the translucent roofing panels on top.
Normally, all my storms with a few exceptions hits us coming from the west or south west. I guess the mountains around here often determine how hard they hit.
I love it you made a funny!!
Since I am in Western Maryland, we "usually" have pretty intense winter weather.
Some of us thin your winter weather is a nice summer day~!
BTW most of my Toms stay outside all winter long..... Very seldom they are all inside the coop, they sleep in the run.
Here is my current pressing situation. A few days ago these 4 Turkeys arrived in my back yard. We found their owner and shooed them home to him. He hatched them from egg with the intent to have them as pets. It is a mom and 3 of her children. Yesterday morning one of them arrived back to my yard. We shooed him home and he came running back to us at which time I realized something was likely wrong. I went down to the neighbors to learn that raccoons attacked the flock at night and killed off all of them except this remaining Turkey. He is alone and very upset and seems to want to be with us. Neighbor said we can/should keep him as the Raccoon has been coming back to his house every night.
Welcome to BYC! Can you post a different picture of him?Hi there, I am new today to this group.
Turkey seems very attached to this area under my second floor deck where he and his flock had liked to gather together a few days prior. There are also two big sliding doors there and he sees his reflection and I believe he thinks his family is on the other side of the glass. At dusk last night he panicked and kept flying into the rafters of my deck looking for a place to land. I ran into my woods and got a large branch and propped it on my deck steps and mounted it to the ceiling rafters so he had a nice high place to rest for the night and he seemed happy with that.
So I have NO experience with birds of any kind. Neighbor says he is a Tom. I have attached a photo of he and his family from the few days before. I have so many questions that I don't even know where to begin. He has been eating and drinking just fine.
We bought a ton of chicken wire for him as we were thinking of converting a tall wooden playhouse on our property into a chicken coop anyway for future chickens. Now that we have this issue, we decided that maybe we should do this now so that he has a place to be. I guess my most pressing questions are
1. From the pictures, can anyone tell me what type of Turkey he is? My reading online suggests maybe a Bronze?
2. Can he be alone and will he be happy? Should we consider a friend?
3. Will he become aggressive as he grows older?
Photo of flock attached as well as photo of the remaining turkey. Is it too soon to tell the gender?
Any and I mean ANY advice would be greatly appreciated. I am at a total loss with no experience on this but really want to do right by him.
Thank you, THANK YOU!
