Putting a turkey in with 5 hens?

[Laci7210]

I have a 7 week old turkey that lives alone. He is a Narragansett. I have 2 bantam hens raising 3 standard chicks. The chicks are 7 weeks also and I think one is a rooster. They are in an 8 by 8 feet chicken tractor. Can I put the turkey in with them?
Would the turkey hurt the chickens?
Would the chickens hurt the turkey?
Will the turkey get sick? (Blackhead?)

 

[PalmRoyal]

From what I understand, black head is deadly to ducks and turkeys, however, chickens can carry it with no ill effects. Then again, turkeys can develope black head from wild birds and eating earthworms. So, just keeping your turkey outside is taking a risk (however, not as big of a risk as keeping it with your chickens). Call me optimistic, but I keep my chickens and muscovies with my royal palms. I have 7 chickens, 9 turkeys and 4 muscovies (not including the babies) all living together in the rabbit barn. So far, we have not had any ill effects. I do, however, keep an eye on all of the turkeys' poop when they "do the deed" and I'm around. I think your turkey will easily outgrow the chicken tractor though. In my 4-H handbook, it says a tom turkey needs 10 square feet per one (more if free ranged).

Hopefully some more people can comment so that you can have more answers that may be more indepth.

 

[chooks4life]

Impossible to say for sure what will happen as it depends on the individual animals' natures/temperaments/mentalities...

That said, introducing another animal to a small area that already has mothers raising increasingly large chicks is practically asking for a serious incident to occur. And it's not even the same species nor an adult which is often just more incentive for violence.

I would give him a run alongside their cage to see and hear them and learn to be part of the flock without being harmed, and I'd look into getting him a turkey hen asap, preferably a young one. If he reaches adulthood and starts trying to mate your banty hens they'll get killed. I had one tom turkey become attracted to chicken hens, had to cull him.

Best wishes.

 

[Laci7210]

Thank you!! My friend has some baby turkeys that she's raising until they are out of the brooder and I'm getting 2 or 3 from her in a week or two. The reason I wanted to move him is because he is living in 2 rabbit cages put together and he needs more space...

 

[chooks4life]

Many turkeys are prone to aggression so I'd avoid giving him a flogging at the hands of the hens to help him remain laid back... Probably best to wait for the other turkeys, cross species aggression is best to avoid triggering.

But as for Blackhead, as PalmRoyal said they can catch it from a variety of sources, especially earthworms, who carry the infected oocysts into the turkeys where they hatch. Chickens can also die from BH but are more resistant, if they're healthy of course.

You can treat BH with antibiotics or simply raw cow's milk with honey, lol, I always used the latter and bred an extremely BH resistant strain of turkeys in a few years. Once they have bright yellow liquid poop they're not too far off death and if you go the natural route you can just let a cup of raw milk sit for an hour or more, scrape off the fat, mix in a teaspoon of honey, let them drink it, and almost all of them will be fine the next day though some may need another cup and a very small percentage doesn't respond. Those who do respond (which is almost all of them) will be resistant and will pass on that immunity.

But whatever treatment you choose, it's your choice and best wishes with it.

Cayenne powder added to their foods, especially when there's been rain, or sprinklers going on lawns, or anything like that which brings up earthworms, can stop the cycle of BH by burning the protective layer off the oocysts so the BH cannot infect the turkeys. There's other ways they catch it too but I always found earthworms to be number one by far. Some say 'cecal drinking' is one way they get water, nutrients, and diseases but to be honest I have never seen any chooks or turkeys do that.

Chooks and turkeys love hot foods, it won't hurt them unless you have severe health issues already present i.e. an ulcerated gastrointestinal tract or something like that. It's an easy way to add some protection.

Best wishes.

 

[Laci7210]

Thanks! I like the cow milk and honey idea! I will try the powder too!

 

[chooks4life]

Thanks! I like the cow milk and honey idea! I will try the powder too!

You're welcome, but I did use raw cow's milk, not homogenized or pasteurized, so don't know if you'll get the same results if you use cooked/pasteurized milk or goats' milk which is naturally homogenized, since the fat is a pretty big issue for any animals suffering BH. But yeah, it worked great for mine.

Best wishes.

 

[PalmRoyal]

You're welcome, but I did use raw cow's milk, not homogenized or pasteurized, so don't know if you'll get the same results if you use cooked/pasteurized milk or goats' milk which is naturally homogenized, since the fat is a pretty big issue for any animals suffering BH. But yeah, it worked great for mine.

Best wishes.

I do not have to do this right yet, however, I know there are people out there like me that like to look through the archives years from now. Would goats milk work as well? Where I live, it is hard to get raw cows milk, but very easy to get raw goats milk. I can't be the only out out there that would be in a predicament like that when the time came around to treating a turkey with blackhead.

If it is the fat that is the issue, could you give them fat cooked off from meats? Sorry that it is an odd question, but I'm just trying to offer more solutions for people in the future.

 

[chooks4life]

I do not have to do this right yet, however, I know there are people out there like me that like to look through the archives years from now. Would goats milk work as well? Where I live, it is hard to get raw cows milk, but very easy to get raw goats milk. I can't be the only out out there that would be in a predicament like that when the time came around to treating a turkey with blackhead.

If it is the fat that is the issue, could you give them fat cooked off from meats? Sorry that it is an odd question, but I'm just trying to offer more solutions for people in the future.

All questions are welcome, it's good to offer any and all potentially helpful info for future reference even if it is strange or currently unexplainable.

The exact cause of this odd treatment being so successful is still a mystery to me though... I wonder if it would work the same with calcium supplements and multi vitamin/mineral supplements being offered in water? That would make sense if it's just the calcium magnesium of the milk combined with the electrolytes and nutrient range in honey that's doing the job, but I don't know if that's all that's actively working there.

Worth trying in a pinch to substitute the ingredients of the cow's milk plus honey combo, though, if you can't get the ingredients I use.

Honey has enzymes, proteins, electrolytes, vitamins, minerals, natural antibiotics and so forth, so it's hard to replace that spectrum artificially without possibly adding something a BH sufferer may not be up to managing. (Most artificial/synthetic supplements are harder on the liver than natural ones as). But there are some really good ones out there apparently which can be the difference between life and death if your animals are in a pinch.

I haven't tried goats' milk on them so don't know if it will work or not, but the reason I suspect it may not work the same is because you cannot easily remove the fat as it's naturally homogenized, so letting a cupful sit for an hour to skim it won't give you that rapid separation of the majority of the fat content like cow's milk does.

For this reason I also don't think homogenized and pasteurized milk would work, as it's not only fat-inclusive but contains cooked fats/proteins, but at a pinch you could still try it, I'd expect low fat milk might be the best bet in that case.

In advanced BH they are hyper-sensitive to fats, especially cooked ones, and cooked proteins as well, and they can kill them as their liver, responsible for handling fats, oils etc (just really all digestion) is already struggling due to the disease.

Cooked fats are extra dangerous to them as they are harder to process than raw ones. Generally turkeys with BH go off pellets with their cooked proteins and oils very quickly, in fact most animals with liver issues go straight off of any cooked proteins because it's harder on the liver and makes them nauseous. I've had liver issues myself and even the smell of cooked fats or cooked proteins can be nauseating when your liver's not coping well.

The best fats for them (as well as us of course) are natural, raw, and with turkeys, preferably vegan sources as adult turkeys in particular aren't big on most animal proteins if given a choice, unlike chooks which as far as I've seen do best on animal protein inclusive diets, particularly insect sourced proteins and fats.

Millet seed's a great protein source for recovering turkeys. Diets of mainly pellets contribute to liver disease and if they've been started on diets like that they can be harder to treat as fatty liver conditions are already often established. We just don't usually notice with livestock we cull before they reach old age, since most of these issues take years to show.

Whole rolled oats have been shown to prevent and reverse fatty liver disease due to the Biotin in them, good to use if you rely on pellets or other cooked proteins for your animals. Some pellet makers are far better than others, cheap and commercial is usually a death sentence delayed, really.

I initially gave the turkeys milk and honey without skimming it, but found that they would either refuse it completely, or would skim it themselves, digging a hole through the floating fat to reach the less fatty milk beneath. They were all almost pathologically obsessed with avoiding consuming any fat beyond the low levels remaining in the milk once it'd been allowed to sit for an hour or so.

From that point on I skimmed it for them since they always refused the fat and the few I did see swallow some fat always did worse, though they too recovered.

By the time they're ready for the treatment, none of them are eating anything and they're just laying down, weak and sick. That's actually a good thing, if you have the rare one that wants to keep eating when its liver is failing, it is the least likely to survive as it's not allowing its liver to rest and heal. Some domestic animals lack the most basic instincts regarding self preservation through avoiding unwise dietary choices that poison them or make them sick, they'll just keep repeating the behavior no matter the results.

Some won't drink initially because they're feeling so sick but if you dip their beak in so they get the taste on their tongues they practically dive into it, and one cup is usually all it takes, the next day they're almost normal. Some require another cup, but if it requires more than two cups chances are it's not going to make it. There is a genetic predisposition to susceptibility to BH, some are very, very weak against it. You can rapidly breed powerful resistance or immunity, I don't know which it is yet having lost my best breeding stock to a few feral pigs... lol... Have to start from scratch using one of their ancestors who never showed susceptibility to it. Anyway. I have not forcefed any this treatment and would think that'd be a mistake almost as a rule in such a case. None have refused it when it's offered though some needed to taste test it first, but, I never forced them to swallow any.

They have an inbuilt feedback loop from tastebuds to brain, a biological mechanism that rapidly notifies them of the safety or desirability of what they're tasting, so can make quick decisions on whether to swallow or not. It's pretty functional in most domestic animals but particularly those allowed to free range; some clearly lack this ability. It's why chooks will taste-test the same plants over and over again, pecking bits then spitting them out, until one day they decide its time has come, the chemical composition is just right for it to be eaten today. (There's been studies done on both that and the biotin in oats vs fatty liver disease which I'm referencing in this post, I don't have the links but both links are on this site on different threads, keywords should bring them up. Or an outside-site search which I generally find more reliable at finding threads than internal searches, lol.)

Giving the milk honey mix when they're still eating normal food is counterproductive and appears to prolong the course of the illness, and they are more likely to not respond when the fasting stage of the illness is reached, which is the ideal time to give the treatment, when they're not eating by choice. When they're naturally fasting, the liver's able to heal and the immune system to fight much better than when they're digesting, but with BH if you let them fast without giving them that treatment they don't come out of it. If you keep giving them the milk and honey it appears to cause a relapse, though they don't usually die from it, they're just sick for longer than necessary.

Liver damage is often not too visible and while recovering from BH they do best on a diet without pellets, corn, red sorghum, or pulses, and do best with whole rolled oats (never 'quick' oats, don't know any animals that want to eat that), millet seeds for raw protein, and lots and lots of green grass or herbs. Dandelion, milkthistle, onion etc all support the liver and turkeys are one livestock animal prone to liver trouble in all forms.

What you feed them after they are back up on their feet will either speed or hinder their healing, but many will look like they were never sick after just one cup given to them when they looked like they were dying, and really they were, as you'd see if you failed to give them treatment at that stage. Best not to take the chance, just in case, of forcing them back onto a grower diet or anything hard on the liver within a month of them recovering.

After a month they should be recovered enough to go back onto a normal diet, that's an outside estimate too, most of mine went back onto a normal diet within days, but my normal diet doesn't include pellets, I prefer to give them other sources of protein like seeds, grains, copra meal etc.

The vast majority of all poultry deaths are due to digestive system disease, specifically involving the liver, so whether turkey or chook it's good to keep their livers in the best state possible and avoiding overreliance on pellets/crumble/mash as the main staple is best. Fresh foods and raw proteins and oils are always best whenever possible but are even more important for animals recovering from severe BH.

Best wishes, hope this helps save some turkeys in future.

 

[PalmRoyal]

Thanks for the reply! I hope that this helps in the future! I find myself all the time looking at archived posts from several years back about cures for odd things and they are always just regurgitating previously stated materials instead of offering more than just one solution or new findings (if there is any). But thank-you fr adding your expertise knowledge to the post!