Frizzled Turkeys??

[jlynnp]

Have any of you seen a Frizzled Turkey?? I have a standard Bronze who I swear is frizzled - never seen this before. I will try to post a picture tomorrow.

 

[chooks4life]

It's not impossible that you could get a similar mutation in turkeys but it's more likely perhaps that it's caused by a deficiency or something like that. Some individuals just can't utilize a normal diet properly, nothing much you can do about them. However that's just speculation obviously, only time and investigation will tell. Looking forward to the pic.

Best wishes.

 

[jlynnp]

Here is the frizzy turkey

 

[chooks4life]

Hmm, well, can't say for sure what it is, but a few things are known to cause abnormal feathering; lack of vitamin D, or copper, or sulfur, or vit A or B's (many nutrients cause abnormal fur/feathers/horns/skin issues when the animal is deficient in them); and genetics of course is another possibility.

Even if you're giving them a good diet, there are so many different things that can go wrong, you're always bound to find an individual sooner or later who can't assimilate a normal diet; it's actually quite common and is a family trait in some lines. Antibiotics can cause that via gastrointestinal tract scarring, some diseases also do, some animals react to chemicals at dosages that others don't... The potential causes are myriad.

About the only way you'd know for sure is to try to address every issue, assuming it's a deficiency (without overdosing the animal somehow) then breed it for a few generations and see if it breeds true. You'd likely have to inbreed to find that out. Lots of speculation, nothing much concrete able to be offered.

This site will be helpful sooner or later, with this issue or another, if you don't already know this stuff or this site:
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Best wishes.