Should we move turkey eggs?

[gavada]

We have a pair of Royal Palm turkeys that are getting ready to lay eggs. While we have a very lovely strawy nest area set up for her in a safe location, she seems to be building her own nest in some brambles by our creek. Is it ok to move the eggs back into a sheltered area after she lays them? Her current location will not be possible to build any sort of fence or shelter around to protect her from the various predators in the area. Thanks!

 

[ivan3]

Yes, move eggs to the nest you want her to use (completely destroy/flatten other nest). Try to keep her in the area of the authorized nest (return to run when she escapes). Keep a good count of how many eggs you've placed in nest - if the count increases by one over the total - she's good to go. This can take a week or so for her to adjust.

 

[gavada]

Thanks! Glad to hear we can move them. Hopefully she will adjust quickly.

 

[kuntrygirl]

Let me know if that works. I tried to move a hen's nest last week and it was a disaster. :/ She went back to the location where she layed the eggs.

 

[gavada]

kuntrygirl - that's sort of what we were afraid of or worse that she would just completely abandon the nest. This is our first go round with turkeys so we're sort of learning as we go. It's been a lot of fun so far though so it would be great if we could get some babies out of this.

 

[kuntrygirl]

kuntrygirl - that's sort of what we were afraid of or worse that she would just completely abandon the nest.  This is our first go round with turkeys so we're sort of learning as we go.  It's been a lot of fun so far though so it would be great if we could get some babies out of this.

I just posted this on another thread but will copy and paste here. This is what I finally had to do. (to include pics) This seems to be working. She is sooooooooo happy now.


After moving the eggs along with her and putting her in the feed storage building, she was ready to leave the area that we prepared for her and go back across the street to my neighbor's house and set in the spot that SHE wanted to set in. So, I gave her her way and let her do what she wanted to do. So before we let her out, we grabbed the eggs and put them back over at the neighbor's house. We let her out of the feed storage building and she runs back over to the neighbor's yard. She looks at her eggs and settles in. So now, It's time to come up with SOMETHING that will work in that she will be safe in the area that she is in (day and night), predators won't find her and kill her and she can have a successful hatch. This is pretty much the last resort because she has stood her ground and made it clear that is what she wanted to do. So in order for me to give her a chance to hatch her own eggs (because I am a LOSER when it comes to hatching eggs), I have to "BUILD" something for her. Well, this is where the tricky part comes in. What can we build within 1 hour that will be safe for her and still keep her out of the rain, keep her cool and allow me to place food and water inside and allow her access as far as leaving out to stretch her legs or whatever. So, I call my neighbor (family friend for about 40 years and also an animal lover) and I tell her the story. All she could do is laugh. So, now it's building time. So my neighbor (who is a former "hoarder") has lots of things that can be used for this project. Soooooooooo, my neighbor had an old dryer that she gutted and had the empty shell laying around. So the back was taken off and shelves from a refrigerator were put on the back area for the vent. The door was removed for fear that it would close and she would not be able to get out. This empty dryer shell was placed directly over her. So, now we have to tie it down and brace it. 2 stakes were placed on each side and wire placed around it. The last thing that I needed to do was to camouflage it so that no one would notice that big ole' white dryer and think it was trash and remove it from my neighbor's property or even better notice a turkey setting on eggs and still my turkey AND her eggs. So, I went into the wooded area of my property and got branches and limbs and placed it over the area that she was in. She didn't move an inch while all of this was going on. So, found water and feed containers and filled them up and put them inside with her. So, the next thing was to find something to cover the door area at night so that varmints or dogs would not go in and kill her. So, I put a small flat shipping crate over the door area and placed a cement pillar in front so that nothing could move the crate. So, needless to say, I'm leasing (her usual weekly free eggs) a 3x5 area on my neighbor's property for 21 more days. I'm on pins and needles that everything will be ok. I walk over to her area every morning and remove the make-shift door and make sure her food and water is ok. After work, I visit her again and right before bed, I go over and close her up. I have been doing this every day and will continue to do this until she hatches her clutch. The things I do for my animals. :/

Below are pics of my girl in her new home. BEWARE: It ain't pretty but it has been working since last week. It is now fully covered with branches, sticks, leaves, etc. You can't even tell anything is there.

 

[gavada]

oh my gosh. that's hysterical. I love it. Hopefully all goes well for you from here on out. Unfortunately we don't have an old dryer lying around, as that would probably work perfectly We do have an old dog kennel/run that we were thinking we'd construct around her but the current location she seems to love is just not providing enough room. We have trouble getting to it which makes it seem fairly safe and secure but I know raccoons, coyotes, foxes etc would have no problem. It's also next to the bees - maybe they'll defend her? She seems pretty stubborn so I'm not exactly sure how well moving her and the nest is going to go over. We may have to just do something similar to what you've done and jerry-rig something together.

 

[gavada]

oh my gosh. that's hysterical. I love it. Hopefully all goes well for you from here on out. Unfortunately we don't have an old dryer lying around, as that would probably work perfectly We do have an old dog kennel/run that we were thinking we'd construct around her but the current location she seems to love is just not providing enough room. We have trouble getting to it which makes it seem fairly safe and secure but I know raccoons, coyotes, foxes etc would have no problem. It's also next to the bees - maybe they'll defend her? She seems pretty stubborn so I'm not exactly sure how well moving her and the nest is going to go over. We may have to just do something similar to what you've done and jerry-rig something together.

 

[gavada]

Ok. An update. We decided to try moving her eggs from the predator friendly nest of her choosing to the nest in the coop of our choosing. We moved them in at night when she went to go in for the evening expecting to have to build her a temporary nesting shelter somewhere else. However, she's a great little trooper, saw her egg in there and decided that she should lay in the coop from now on. We're slowly getting a nice stash of eggs in there and hopefully she'll begin to sit on them more regularly soon. Here's hoping for a successful hatch. Thanks for all of the input and advise.

 

[kuntrygirl]

Ok. An update.  We decided to try moving her eggs from the predator friendly nest of her choosing to the nest in the coop of our choosing.  We moved them in at night when she went to go in for the evening expecting to have to build her a temporary nesting shelter somewhere else.  However, she's a great little trooper, saw her egg in there and decided that she should lay in the coop from now on.  We're slowly getting a nice stash of eggs in there and hopefully she'll begin to sit on them more regularly soon.  Here's hoping for a successful hatch.  Thanks for all of the input and advise.

Good job. Sending good vibes your way. Keep us posted.