Turkey Talk for 2014

[chickadoodles]

I stopped feeding my flock layer feed as I believe it caused my roosters toes to curl sideways. It happened to two of my roosters. So now I feed them all grower finisher and my hens are still laying like crazy even without oyster shells. Because the roosters were eating the oyster shells also. I do add a little fish meal to my feed now and then. When my turkey were in the same pen as the chickens I put the fish meal in the feed every time I filled the feeders up. And it never hurt any of them they love it.

 

[Timba]

Never mind! My first chick. Hopefully poults in a few days.

Is that incubator from incubator warehouse?? How stable is it?

 

[gevshiba]

Is that incubator from incubator warehouse?? How stable is it?

Yes, it's the IncuVeiw. It's my first incubator and my first hatch. I've had no problems with it at all. The 2 chicks hatched right on time. Two others I tossed, but never really thought they'd hatch when I put them in. Poults are due today and not one pip yet. I have a bad feeling about them, but I don't think it has anything to do with the incubator. My eggs sat out on the counter for too long because, I first couldn't decide what I wanted, then the first one was damaged and had to be returned. It doesn't hold a lot of eggs. I had 4 chicken and 19 turkey eggs in it. I do love that the top is completely clear, except right in the middle where the fan/display is. I also liked that it's all plastic rather than Styrofoam.

 

[Sydney Acres]

How do you feed the cockerels differently? Do you keep them in different housing?

Yes, it only works if you separate your cockerels. Years ago Dr. Charles Everett, president of the Society for the Preservation of Poultry Antiquities, wrote an article about how he raises his dual purpose breeds. His goal is to select for cockerels that can thrive on free range conditions, as they did when the breeds were developed, with very little supplemental food. In doing so he feels that he can return the breeds to their original SOP form quicker. He raises the pullets and cockerels together until they are 12 weeks old (I think he said 18% protein but I might not remember that right), then the cockerels go to his pasture until they are 6 months old. While in the pasture he gives them what he describes as "very little food," just enough to keep them growing and "get them into the barn every night." His cockerel diet is 14% protein (I remember being surprised at how low it was), with a portion of it being whole oats, which he felt was important for them to grow at a slow but steady rate. At 6 months of age he rounds up those wild things and evaluates their condition. He only keeps the ones that are hardy enough to thrive on that type of management. The rest go in the finishing pen.

I can see the benefit in that. One of my free range roosters was so busy escorting and guarding his hens his first year that he didn't take time to eat much, and started to loose weight towards the end of breeding season. I dewormed him just in case, then decided to take him off the roost every evening for a few minutes and offer him food. He acted like he was starving! So selecting for roosters that either fatten quickly in a pen or thrive in a pasture would produce an ideal free range dual purpose bird.

When I raise enough birds I do separate out my cockerels, but not quite that young. Basically I'm getting the obvious culls away from the flock as they're starting to get obnoxious, which usually starts around 14 weeks. I try to raise the best few cockerels in with the pullets just so it won't be such a shock to everyone when they're later put together for breeding. When I raise just a few chicks at a time then everyone stays together, unless the young boys are causing problems.

 

[Sydney Acres]

I stopped feeding my flock layer feed as I believe it caused my roosters toes to curl sideways. It happened to two of my roosters. So now I feed them all grower finisher and my hens are still laying like crazy even without oyster shells. Because the roosters were eating the oyster shells also. I do add a little fish meal to my feed now and then. When my turkey were in the same pen as the chickens I put the fish meal in the feed every time I filled the feeders up. And it never hurt any of them they love it.

How did you determine that the extra calcium was causing the problem? If a bird has a normal metabolism, unneeded extra calcium should just pass through the intestinal tract without causing problems. Parathyroid hormone and vitamin D are very finely tuned to allow the body to absorb only what is needed, specifically to prevent excess calcium from entering the bloodstream and causing harm.

In a typical 26 hour egg cycle, the shell takes 18 hours to form. During that time, the hen uses 100% of the calcium in her blood every 16-20 minutes. It gets replaced constantly by what's stored in her bones and absorbed from the intestinal system. During the 8 hours of the cycle that she's not forming a new shell, the calcium that's being absorbed is resupplying her bones with the amount that was used creating the previous shell. It's an extremely dynamic system, with calcium being moved from the intestines to the blood to the bones for storage, then from the bones to the blood to the eggshell for use at a phenomenal rate. One of the advantages of oyster shells is that they take some time to break down in the gizzard, so they're in the system supplying calcium even through the night after most of the layer food has moved through.

If there's not enough calcium being supplied through the diet, via layer diet or oyster shells or limestone or something, then eventually the bones will thin in most birds. Some will get away with it long term, others won't. Logically none should, but nature has a way of keeping us going despite logic. But nature did not create a chicken or turkey that lays more than 100 eggs per year. That was done through selective breeding, and was supported by a modified diet that provided the supplies to maintain that production -- i.e., extra calcium. Feeding laying hens a diet without extra calcium is a huge risk, especially as the hens get older.

 

[Arielle]

I am no expert on poultry, but have experienced the effects of excess calcium in the layers: tiny grains of calcium deposited on the out side of the shell that rubs off with a little effort. IT is laid dwon before the coloring in my marans girls. IN roosters, many of the old heritage breeders talk about the calicum being a problem for the roosters-- that ultimatly causes an early removal from the flock due to health reasons. ( No personal experience with that myself yet.)

 

[Timba]

I bui

Yes, it's the IncuVeiw.  It's my first incubator and my first hatch.  I've had no problems with it at all.  The 2 chicks hatched right on time.  Two others I tossed, but never really thought they'd hatch when I put them in.  Poults are due today and not one pip yet.  I have a bad feeling about them, but I don't think it has anything to do with the incubator.  My eggs sat out on the counter for too long because, I first couldn't decide what I wanted, then the first one was damaged and had to be returned.  It doesn't hold a lot of eggs.  I had 4 chicken and 19 turkey eggs in it.  I do love that the top is completely clear, except right in the middle where the fan/display is.  I also liked that it's all plastic rather than Styrofoam. 

I built my own and got 3 out of 8 from it. I just want one with an auto turner that'll be somewhat affordable and reliable. I've been looking at the incukit itself, but if your incubator already has it and an auto turner I may be hooked!!!

 

[gevshiba]

I bui
I built my own and got 3 out of 8 from it. I just want one with an auto turner that'll be somewhat affordable and reliable. I've been looking at the incukit itself, but if your incubator already has it and an auto turner I may be hooked!!!

It does have the auto turner. I think it was extra, but it was still less than the Hovabator 1588.

 

[Sydney Acres]

I am no expert on poultry, but have experienced the effects of excess calcium in the layers: tiny grains of calcium deposited on the out side of the shell that rubs off with a little effort. IT is laid dwon before the coloring in my marans girls. IN roosters, many of the old heritage breeders talk about the calicum being a problem for the roosters-- that ultimatly causes an early removal from the flock due to health reasons. ( No personal experience with that myself yet.)

That could really affect the appearance of your Maran eggs! Is that something that you notice with your whole flock, or just with a certain percentage of eggs? I notice that with specific hens, regardless of calcium levels. The oviduct seems to fail to smooth out the shell surface properly, leaving patches of rough calcium that is not fully cemented to the shell, which can flake off easily. On some hens it's little grains like you describe, and on others it's small rough patches.

I've not experienced problems with my roosters with extra calcium, but most management problems are a function of the total picture, not just one item. Theoretically, roosters would only absorb excessive calcium if they have too much vitamin D in their diet (or had a problem with their parathyroid gland or were in kidney failure, both of which should be very rare). Lots of people used to add cod liver oil to everyone's diet, including their livestock. Cod liver oil contains large amounts of vitamins A and D, and was historically an important nutritional supplement for people (before all commercial milk was supplemented with these vitamins) to prevent rickets in children and osteoporosis in the elderly, or for people who didn't get enough vitamin D through sun exposure. So any excess vitamin D, whether from cod liver oil or other sources, combined with extra calcium, would definitely be a problem. It would disrupt the normal regulation of calcium absorption and allow too much to be taken into the blood, creating kidney disease, joint problems, muscle weakness, constipation, feather/nail/beak malformations, or numerous other issues, depending on the amount in excess and the individual bird's ability to excrete the extra calcium. And it would be much worse in roosters, since they're not using all the extra calcium for eggshells. I could see that happening regularly, especially several decades ago when cod liver oil was commonly sold by the gallon for livestock. Now it would be less common, and more likely to occur from feed mixed in small mills -- sometimes the supplement mixes aren't measured right, or isn't mixed properly, so you get a bit too much or too little of something. Not a problem in the short term, but if your feed from the same lot lasts a long time and it wasn't mixed right, you could see problems.

 

[chickadoodles]

How did you determine that the extra calcium was causing the problem? If a bird has a normal metabolism, unneeded extra calcium should just pass through the intestinal tract without causing problems. Parathyroid hormone and vitamin D are very finely tuned to allow the body to absorb only what is needed, specifically to prevent excess calcium from entering the bloodstream and causing harm.

In a typical 26 hour egg cycle, the shell takes 18 hours to form. During that time, the hen uses 100% of the calcium in her blood every 16-20 minutes. It gets replaced constantly by what's stored in her bones and absorbed from the intestinal system. During the 8 hours of the cycle that she's not forming a new shell, the calcium that's being absorbed is resupplying her bones with the amount that was used creating the previous shell. It's an extremely dynamic system, with calcium being moved from the intestines to the blood to the bones for storage, then from the bones to the blood to the eggshell for use at a phenomenal rate. One of the advantages of oyster shells is that they take some time to break down in the gizzard, so they're in the system supplying calcium even through the night after most of the layer food has moved through.

If there's not enough calcium being supplied through the diet, via layer diet or oyster shells or limestone or something, then eventually the bones will thin in most birds. Some will get away with it long term, others won't. Logically none should, but nature has a way of keeping us going despite logic. But nature did not create a chicken or turkey that lays more than 100 eggs per year. That was done through selective breeding, and was supported by a modified diet that provided the supplies to maintain that production -- i.e., extra calcium. Feeding laying hens a diet without extra calcium is a huge risk, especially as the hens get older.

I bought a one year old Wellie rooster that was in perfect health and put him in charge of my hens. After several months of eating the layer feed one if his toes curled and then all of them. He was fine before. I had this happen to two other roosters one was a leghorn and the other was an EE that were fine till I switched to layer feed. I will never feed layer again. Just from what I saw in my own flock. Anyone can do as they please with feeding their flocks. But I was just sharing my experience....