Bourbon Red Turkey Sexes??

[Grampa with chickens]

I know your pain. After a couple of botched incubation tries, I found someone local who had some poults for sale. I got ne a tom.

Don't give up hope. If there's a will, there's a way.

 

[ChanceRider]

Quote:
Thanks Grampa... I'm keepingmy fingers crossed! Guess I'll know on or about the 18th as that's their hatch date. LOL, anyone in the Sacramento area with Bourbon Reds? Ooops, gotta have more faith in my little Brinsea!

 

[chickygirl2]

Well, it does appear that all 5 are girls- amazing ! They are so friendly and I was sure I had all boys ...lol....... I definately needed girls for my lonely 2 toms....

 

[Harp Turkey Ranch]

Last year a guy hatched out 14 of our Wishard bronze turkeys and emailed me that he only got 2 toms and 12 hens out of the hatch, I wish it worked like that for me.

He was mad because he wanted more toms as he was selling them to the holiday market.

 

[Grampa with chickens]

Roh, roh Rorge.

I went out to feed the critters this morning. As I was looking closer to my turkeys, I am starting to notice differences. I think I have 2 toms now. I guess one of my original 2 poults must have been a tom. I feather sexed them while they were little and thought I had one of each. Not that this is any kind of accurate. As they got older I couldn't tell. Now they are about 3 ish months old. 2 toms and 2 hens is now the count. Oh well, that's OK. I guess I will have to decide if one of the toms stays or he becomes a guest at Thanksgiving. Decisions, decisions.

 

[Marty1876]

great pics

 

[txturkey]

Here's my Bourbon Reds, about 23 weeks old. Im thinking i have 1 female, 3 males?

 

[R2elk]

Here's my Bourbon Reds, about 23 weeks old. Im thinking i have 1 female, 3 males?

I am curious why you think any of the turkeys in the photo is a tom. Bourbon Red hens have light colored lower edges on their breast feathers. The breast feathers of a Bourbon Red tom are a solid color and do not have light colored edges.

I right clicked on your image and opened in a new tab which opens the image at its full size. Viewing the image in that fashion shows me 4 Bourbon Red hens since all four appear to have light colored lower edges on their breast feathers. I also did not see any other indications that would point to any of them being toms.

Good luck.

 

[RobG7aChattTN]

I'm glad that I found this thread. The very day that I read this the Tom finally had a snood that was showing longer than a half inch. His feet are also larger than those of my two hens. I always thought that he was a male and the other two were hens ever since I got them at a few days old (I tried to pick a trio out of the group). Looking for the dark edge on the back feathers of the male vs. the light edge on the back feathers of the females made it easy. My birds are just about three months old.

 

[R2elk]

I'm glad that I found this thread. The very day that I read this the Tom finally had a snood that was showing longer than a half inch. His feet are also larger than those of my two hens. I always thought that he was a male and the other two were hens ever since I got them at a few days old (I tried to pick a trio out of the group). Looking for the dark edge on the back feathers of the male vs. the light edge on the back feathers of the females made it easy. My birds are just about three months old.

From your photo it does appear that you have two hens and a tom. It is only the breast feathers of the adults that can indicate the sex of the turkey. The adult breast feathers of dark colored hen turkeys will have a light colored bottom edge while the adult breast feathers of dark colored tom turkeys will either be black or just the same solid color as the rest of the feather.

The back feathers have no meaning as both the hens and toms can have solid color without any light lower edge colors.