Just won a breeding pair, now what?

[winky]

I went to a poultry show yesterday and entered a raffle for a breeding pair of royal palm turkeys... and I won! I was really shocked and unprepared. So, I brought the 5 month old pair home and this morning I released them on the property (2.5 acres, mostly wooded) with the rest of the free range flock (chickens, ducks and geese) and they started wandering all over the place. I had to track them down several times before I finally realized they aren't going to be like all my other birds. My other birds have all stayed really close in the beginning and still have never even been close to the property lines. I figured this pair would be the same but they acted like they had no sense of territory or even concern about where they were headed. Is this typical of turkeys? Am I going to have to take it really slow with these guys? Do turkeys generally have the sense to stay with the flock or stay close to home? I wont keep them if I have to pen them up. Any advise on free ranging turkeys?

 

[jasonm11]

you need to pen them for a few weeks until they get to know that you mean food and then they wi;; stay close

 

[crj]

You will have to give them a pen to live in so they can get familiar with there new home and all the new birds. They are probably wondering becasue they are lost and looking for a safe place to stay. They are babies and probably afraid of everything around them. Let them get to know you and the new living arrangments then they will be ok.