For all of you new poult/turkey owners, BYC is a great place to learn about raising poults and turkeys. Learn as much as you can and ask as many questions as you can. There is no such thing as a dumb question. What you may think is a dumb question is not dumb and you can bet that there are others who want to ask the same question but afraid to. No one here on this thread will laugh at you or ridicule you for wanting to learn all that you can.
The reason that I am saying this is because I am getting an increasing amount of emails and calls from people in my area who want to buy eggs, poults and turkeys and have no idea what they are doing and have never raised them before. Their poults and turkeys are dying and they are wanting to re-place the dead ones with more. Well, you can keep replacing dead poults or adults but until you find out why they are all dying, you will never solve your problem.
The basic things that I try to tell these people when they call me is...
1. Make sure your poults are ALWAYS warm. Your poults will tell you if they are too hot or too cold. Watch their behaviors.
2. A wet poult is a dead poult, so make sure they don't get wet and freeze to death.
3. Always make sure that you SEE your poults eating and drinking. Don't assume that your new babies are eating and drinking because they WILL die within a few days.
4. If you just have to, you can put a few baby chicks with your poults so that the chicks can teach the poults how to eat.
5. Make sure your hens are safe and secure from any predator when setting on her nest of eggs. All we can do is try our best to have them in a protected area.
6. Make sure that your hen has access to food and water and these things are at a very close distance to where she is. Make sure that she KNOWS where this food and water is. Do not make your hen have to walk a far distance for her food and water if you can help it. I know that we all have those sneaky hens that will wander off and lay a clutch of eggs in the next city and will only come out to eat and drink. Well, we can't control that but if we know that we have a setting hen, make her as comfortable as possible. Make it an easy 28 days for her if possible. (I know someone who had a hen who died while setting on her nest of eggs. I suspect she starved because her feed was so far away from where her nest was. She never got up to eat. Poor hen.)
7. If your hen is in an unsafe environment when the poults are hatched, you may want to take the poults from her and try to raise them yourself because if not, a predator may get them AND your hen. So, in the end you will not have poults or a mama but if you try to raise them yourself, you will have a better chance of saving the babies and the mom will be safe as well, if she is away from that unsafe environment.
8. DO NOT keep the tom and the poults together. The tom may try to kill the poults. Keep them separated.
9. Proper nutrition is important for a poult and turkey. Free ranging, bugs, fruits, veggies and good feed is a great diet for a turkey.
10. Check out your birds routinely and look for any signs of unusual behavior, symptoms, illnesses, etc. Again, your birds will tell you when they are sick.
11. If you can, pick up your birds from time to time and do a feel check. Check for sounds of congested breathing, check for foul odor in the mouth, check for weight loss, protruding breast bones. And of course, check their feet.
12. Try to have on had a few meds in the event your birds get sick. Common disease in turkeys are sinus problems, respiratory problems and black head. Be proactive and have these meds on hand so that you can treat your turkey if your turkey gets sick. You don't want to be caught on the weekend and no feed stores are open. Keep printed out information on these illnesses and keep on hand, so that you can treat your birds. Have proper supplies on hand (needles, etc.)
13. De-worm your turkeys routinely
14. DO NOT bring home any sick birds.
15. If you do buy birds from other people, please quarantine them for at least 30 days. DO NOT put new birds with your healthy birds.
16. DO NOT believe someone that you don't know when they tell you that there birds are healthy.
17. DO NOT let other people who have birds walk about your chicken yard. They may bring in contaminated or infected poop and drop in your chicken yard and if your birds eat and ingest the infected poop, your birds could become sick and die.
These are just a few things to keep in mind for all of the new owners and some of use old tymers as well. We never know everything about our birds. Every day is a learning experience and this is why we come to BYC and this thread, so that we can learn from others and from other's mistakes and experiences.
If I have missed any tips that others would like to add, please do so.
I just felt the need to talk about this because of all of the calls that I am getting about people losing their turkeys. Our animals should not have to suffer because we as owners "don't know" how to care for them. Knowledge is Power.
