Peafowl or Turkeys?

[fat brown hen]

You only learn to care for them by having them.

That's exactly what I told my mom when she wouldn't let me have a pet monkey.

 

[Tonyroo]

That's exactly what I told my mom when she wouldn't let me have a pet monkey.

Don't keep a monkey. There meant to be a wild species.

 

[fat brown hen]

We've always had free-ranging peafowl. They can occasionally be a bother but it's primarily because they are friendly and so food oriented (they're beggers). For us, turkeys were a disaster because the male was so mean. He'd stand in the path and not let anyone get by without charging and nipping

Are these turkeys and peafowl that you raised yourself? And they all just free-range and stick around?

 

[fat brown hen]

Don't keep a monkey. There meant to be a wild species.

That's exactly what I told my mom when she brought home my baby brother.

 

[TurkeyLady26]

I don't have any immediate plans, but I've been thinking about adding a new species and have some questions.

Peafowl vs Turkeys
-----------------------
Which one is more willing to come home to roost?
Which one will wander farther?
Which one is more fragile as a baby?
Ability to imprint on chickens and see them as their "flock"?
Minimum flock size (ie, can I keep just one male+female pair)?
What to do if I have too many males? (I already know the answer for turkeys)

There are wild turkeys, and also feral (?) peafowl in my neighborhood, so I'm not worried about blackhead disease (although I do have access to an excellent avian vet if it comes up).

Can’t speak for the peafowl, however I can answer at least partially for the turkeys. I absolutely love my turkeys they are friendly, quirky, sweet, and social birds. I got mine from a local breeder who suggested I keep my three hens and a Tom locked up for a week or two in order for them to realize that this was their home. I have successfully free-ranged them completely through the entirety of the fall and winter (they chose to stay in our goat shelters during the stretch of minus 45 degree weather and managed beautifully) they are now at laying age. The farthest that they have travelled so far is just barely out of our driveway this spring once the snow melted, however now they are back to normal and are staying in the yard and routinely go up to roost at the same spot everyday as soon as the sun hits a certain point in the sky. Oh! And they also come when called and do anything for some black oil sunflower seeds, forbid I am late feeding those . Hope this helped somewhat! Good luck with whatever you choose!

 

[fat brown hen]

yes.

Cool! As one of the few people who have experience with both, did you notice any difference in how far they wander? Or were they pretty much the same in that regard? It sounds like both species could imprint on humans.

 

[KsKingBee]

Our peafowl wander over our three acres plus several acres of our neighbors on both sides. The turkey we had did not wander very much at all. The turkey adventure did not last very long though before we were disgusted and quit.

I don't know that any of them imprinted on humans.

Our free rangers rarely wander more than a hundred yards away. We also loved our Royal Palms but were concerned about them transmitting disease to our peas and sold them.

 

[Midnightman14]

Well, none of my animals are very practical

Is the learning curve about the same for peas vs turkeys, or are peas much harder? Would turkeys make a good "gateway drug" to keeping peafowl?

Peafowl are much harder than turkeys. Turkeys are domesticated and much hardier than peafowl. The best gateway drug to peafowl is keeping pheasants like goldens or ring necks they have next to nothing in common with barnyard poultry besides being birds.