Help Turkey Experts!

[chickenzoo]

Looks girly to me too. When you hold it or pet it does it make any churping sounds, or peeoww, peeoww or squat?

 

[cheeps]

Well, he/she makes a, I'd call it a chirping sound, sounds like a peep peeping but much louder. Little chirps and peeps!

 

[hunter1hall]

If you know someone who turkey hunts and can use a call, you can make hen calls to her and listen to how she responds. I take my calls out all the time and talk to my birds. It works great if they wonder out of sight, they come running when I start calling to them.

 

[Professional]

It is a Narragansett. Poorly marked, but still a Narragansett.

BTW, jake is considered a hunting term. Proper terminology for domestic turkeys is tom, or cockerel.

Be careful of introducing strange new birds to your flock without properly quarantining them first. It's a great way to introduce diseases or parasites, especially from birds which you don't know the history of. Excessive tameness could be a sign of weakness and poor health. From the photos he looks to be very thin. Maybe it's just very poor (narrow) conformation, but could be very thin as well.

 

[cheeps]

He really didn't give me a chance to quarantine him as he was in the coop with my chickens when I found him! I might be new to turkeys but not new to poultry...he may be thin but he's not a sick thin. He has great bright eyes and is very energetic. At any rate, I ALWAYS quarantine new birds, I'm a little paranoid about it usually, but he really invited himself in and spent 8 hours with my ladies before I knew he was there!

So, is the consensis now that he is a SHE?

 

[Boggy Bottom Bantams]

I'm thinking so, with the hairy head, nubby snood, feathering up the back of the neck and lack of much wattle, you may have a bearded hen.
Oh, And I am a hunter, so young male Turkeys are jakes to me, never heard one called a cockerel by anyone, that's a chicken in my book.
As for the sex, he/she seems to be a stumper, like the other post said, if your hubbys hunting buddys could call around it, it should Gobble instinctively if it's a tom. The sounds you discribed are hens vocalizations, but Jakes do them too, just not very much.
I'm saying bearded hen for now, keep us posted
Aubrey

 

[GBov]

"BTW, jake is considered a hunting term. Proper terminology for domestic turkeys is tom, or cockerel."

I first got into turkeys in Ireland where a male turkey is called a Stag. Cant think of them any other way now