Hello! Please 1-Tell me about your experiences with your turkeys & ducks in your garden.......

[boyss7]

Hello! Please 1-Tell me about your experiences with your turkeys & ducks in your garden.
2-Can turkeys & ducks live together without problems?
3-Does anybody knows what turkeys & ducks eat in the wild? (plant names, please).
4-Ducks & turkeys eat everything? or what you feed them? (real food not feed from the pet store)
5- Do ducks need a pool?
6- I will be raising turkeys & ducks from birth, what precautions should I take?
7- I have a chicken coop plus space outside cover with a net & protected with fence, we will cut some of their feathers but is that enough, so they won't fly away? (turkeys & ducks)
8- At what age turkeys & ducks start reproducing? In when? (spring, summer, etc)
What is the ratio ( 1 tom to how many females?).
Thank you very much in advance

 

[R2elk]

Hello! Please 1-Tell me about your experiences with your turkeys & ducks in your garden.
2-Can turkeys & ducks live together without problems?
3-Does anybody knows what turkeys & ducks eat in the wild? (plant names, please).
4-Ducks & turkeys eat everything? or what you feed them? (real food not feed from the pet store)
5- Do ducks need a pool?
6- I will be raising turkeys & ducks from birth, what precautions should I take?
7- I have a chicken coop plus space outside cover with a net & protected with fence, we will cut some of their feathers but is that enough, so they won't fly away? (turkeys & ducks)
8- At what age turkeys & ducks start reproducing? In when? (spring, summer, etc)
What is the ratio ( 1 tom to how many females?).
Thank you very much in advance

If you use the advanced search feature at the top of the page, you can find all of your answers by searching the forums.

 

[ILuvMyFlock]

Hello! Please 1-Tell me about your experiences with your turkeys & ducks in your garden.
2-Can turkeys & ducks live together without problems?
3-Does anybody knows what turkeys & ducks eat in the wild? (plant names, please).
4-Ducks & turkeys eat everything? or what you feed them? (real food not feed from the pet store)
5- Do ducks need a pool?
6- I will be raising turkeys & ducks from birth, what precautions should I take?
7- I have a chicken coop plus space outside cover with a net & protected with fence, we will cut some of their feathers but is that enough, so they won't fly away? (turkeys & ducks)
8- At what age turkeys & ducks start reproducing? In when? (spring, summer, etc)
What is the ratio ( 1 tom to how many females?).
Thank you very much in advance

Hello there, I will gladly answer your questions to the best of my abilities!

1. I have nothing but wonderful experiences with raising turkeys, ducks, and other species together. As for raising them in a garden, good luck - they would love more than anything to eat the garden lol!

2. Yes, turkeys and ducks can live in harmony together. Mine do anyway. But I will say that in order to raise different species one would need the proper amount of yard space to do so to avoid any issues that may arise, even though I have yet to have any real issues.

3. Well it depends on whether the turkey and duck is domesticated or wild. Domestic birds usually eat feed / starter, grower, or layer depending on the age, they can also eat cracked corn, grass, and scraps. As for wild birds I am not really an expert but they are more apt to forage for things like plants, shrubs, grass, berries, nuts, and so forth.

4. I tend to think so, I don't typically feed my birds meat though as that would seem odd and cannibalistic lol. Well I don't necessarily recommend omitting feed from the pet store from these birds diets but to each their own, as some individuals do feed pure grass etc. Mine eat feed, cracked / whole corn, mixed seeds, grass, berries, fruits, and vegetables, I feed them scraps as well, along with dried mealworms. If they are fed well they will produce eggs with a dark orange yolk, unlike the bird eggs from the pet store which have a weak yellow yolk which is stemmed from malnutrition in my humble opinion.

5. No they do not need a pool perse' but they won't be too happy without one. I feel that a pool or a pond helps keep the ducks in the yard, because ducks absolutely love to swim! swimming makes them very happy! One could purchase a kiddie pool for just around $10. I have 2 kiddie pools, a little pond we built, and a stream beside our yard, and none of my ducks have taken off on their own because the pools and the attention well and the food too lol keep them wanting to stay here.

6. Most of mine I have here I have hatched myself from an egg (incubator), sometimes I allow my birds to raise and hatch their own, but I will warn you some breeds are not too prone to hatch their own, what I mean is some are broodier than others whereas some are not so broody. As for precautions I recommend researching how many days it takes for the egg to hatch as chickens and ducks have a different amount, I think chickens take around 23 days to hatch? as for ducks it takes them more I think around 28? Turkeys I think is about the same as chickens I think? anyway my hubby usually does that part for me. Another precaution is I recommend researching how to keep the perfect temps and humidity, usually incubators have the temps set, and they have a humidity gauge. If a bird does not hatch within a day I recommend wrapping a wet piece of paper towel around them to help moisten their egg which in turn helps them hatch, and if that fails, I recommend helping them out by very carefully peeling back some of the hard shell only (not the inner soft shell) back from their peep hole, just enough to help them do the rest. I also want to warn you that no matter how hard one tries many of the babies will not make it, sadly that's a part of life, so don't feel guilty if this happens, and be prepared because this can happen a baby being born not fully developed it's a sad sight...

7. I never recommend cutting their feathers. For one turkeys (domestic ones) cannot fly that far anyway unless they are of a non domestic breed, and if they are raised since they were young they will more than likely never fly away. I have many turkeys and none have flown away yet, even though some fly over the fence to forage they come right back. As for ducks, the same sort of applies, most domestic ducks cannot fly far unless one obtains a mallard or another migrating duck and even then I do not recommend clipping their wings, I would get a pool or a pond and that would help them want to stay. I have yet to have any of my ducks fly off, sure they fly a tad over the fence but they like the turkeys always come back.

8. Gosh hmm... I am no expert but I do believe some ducks can lay an egg everyday, whereas for others it's every other day, or every so often etc etc. Mine seem to literally lay all the time, and I try my best to hatch them all in my incubator. As for turkeys they are kind of different, they only lay in certain seasons - Spring to Summer I think? Around 4 months? When they do lay the eggs that are fertilized anyway they can lay a clutch of around 16 at a time, but the amount varies, and sadly if the eggs are not incubated usually vermin will try to eat most of the eggs, and even if the eggs are incubated some may not make it... it's sad really. As for the breeding ratio, ehh some do like a tom to 3-5 hens or so yada yada, but for me all of my turkeys and ducks free range so they just breed whenever they want to, and I incubate what I can and I let nature run it's course. I never was one for structure like that, I just go with the flow. Of course for my chickens I do separate them because sometimes we eat the eggs here even though I honestly let the hens eat most of their eggs, anyway I don't want to ingest an egg that was fertilized if that makes sense, I just couldn't stand the thought of aborting an egg.

 

[marelynnshapiro]

Hello, My duck's love their large baby pool. It gets very dirty so we chang the,water every other day. Twice the pool got leaks from dragging it when we flip it over so we put the new one inside the old one problem solved. I'm sure tge ducks,would like,a larger pool. Im thinking of digging a big pond with a filter. The must have at least a pool...you will understand,when you see their Joy when they get in the water they flip and go under a clean themselves very thoroughly flap their wings and they just go nuts. Regarding how many eggs they lay if you check on the various breeds on this site it will tell you how many eggs they will leg per year.

 

[ILuvMyFlock]

Hello, My duck's love their large baby pool. It gets very dirty so we chang the,water every other day. Twice the pool got leaks from dragging it when we flip it over so we put the new one inside the old one problem solved. I'm sure tge ducks,would like,a larger pool. Im thinking of digging a big pond with a filter. The must have at least a pool...you will understand,when you see their Joy when they get in the water they flip and go under a clean themselves very thoroughly flap their wings and they just go nuts. Regarding how many eggs they lay if you check on the various breeds on this site it will tell you how many eggs they will leg per year.

Well said.

 

[boyss7]

WOW, THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR YOUR ANSWERS

!!

 

[tequila]

I had a duck with my chickens he thought he was a chicken I had a pond for him he never would go in.. he seriously walked bobbing his head like a chicken I think he was a chicken by adoption...