Are chickens and turkeys friends?

[mirandamommy]

I would like to get a few turkeys. Can they be housed with the chickens or would they need their own coop and run?

 

[Darin115]

I have a tom and a hen turkey in with my chickens. They get along fine. In the morning the rooster crows and the tom gobbles. They take turns for an hour or so every morning.

The chicken hens used top bully the turkey hen but all that changed after about 2 weeks. Now the chickens get out of her way when she comes to eat.

Darin

 

[farmgirlie1031]

I have a young tom that runs with my Cornish. They get along great. People say to keep them seperate because of the chance for Blackhead. But I only have 1 turkey because that is all they had for sale and it was too stressed out all alone. My turkey is now 3 1/2 to 4 months old.

 

[jab91864]

Most folks will discourage keeping them together because turkeys are susceptible to black head which can be transmitted to them thru chicken fecal matter if I recall correctly.

That being said I have in the past raised my turkeys with my chickens and ducks..... old style farm flock. Grandmas did for how many generations so I figure it can't be all bad.

The only issue I had with the turkeys being with the flock was on occasion a tom can become agitated or aggressive to another flock member. They are considerably larger than my chickens and this could be dangerous. I had a silkie that I believe was attacked by a tom in my yard. Other than that incident I never had a problem ........

Best of luck !!!

 

[monarc23]

We had 1 tom (broad breasted bronze) and 2 hens in with a flock of chickens of various breeds...that tom from a youngster (with barely any feathers on) killed several chickens roosters and hens...he tried to mate them and when he crushed them to death he'd peck out their eyes and just peck their whole bodies...we'd come home from somewehere to a crushed swish cheese looking pullet on the ground...it was really upsetting.

 

[AHappychick]

Quote:
oh that stinks sorry

 

[moduckman]

I have turkeys with chickens. Had this for a long time. What I can say is that turkeys will gang up on an injured chicken, often killing it. But if everyone stays healthy, then it poses no problems.

 

[cutiepieacres]

I have 2 turkeys in with my free range chickens. They do ok. I did have an incidnet where I had some young(6-20 week) chicks that got to go out into the "big pen" since they were big enough to be without the heat. I found quite a few a few days later that had been killed. I figured squirrels(they can be evil) got in, though they had never hurt the bigger chickens. Later on after moving the chicks out and letting them get again bigger, I put them back in and found the culprit. My two turkeys were stalking and hunting these young chickens. They would get down low, herd them into the corner and then attack. It was kinda scary to think that my Petey(my Royal palm turkey, she is my baby) was doing this. But now I know she is fine with the adults but will hunt the littler ones, I just have to make sure she is separated from the juveniles.

 

[ninjapoodles]

Our extra roos that we don't want mingling with the laying flock live in the turkey pen. I can let the turkeys out in the morning and put them back up in the evening without the chickens escaping, if you can believe that.

They don't seem to be "friends," but rather to have a kind of guarded ignoring thing going on with each other. I really believe that the only reason I can get away with keeping them confined together is that the turkey pen is HUGE, with 14' roof and plenty of places for them to get away from each other. I have no doubt that if I cooped them up in close quarters, the turkeys would make short work of the roosters.