Turkeys For 2013

[chicken pickin]

My March 2012 hen hatch has been laying eggs and the boys are mounting.

What is your Tom/hen ratio?

 

[kuntrygirl]

Celie, yes I agree with you in that the males are more outgoing than the females.

And yes, like a sex link. I cannot find anyone else who has had this happen. The light colored poults have only been hatching a few years now.

I really want to splurge and get some BOSS but it is SO expensive. It's up to $29.99 at TSC. That is a big chunk of change.

 

[kuntrygirl]

My March 2012 hen hatch has been laying eggs and the boys are mounting.

What is your Tom/hen ratio?

TOO MANY!

Seriously though, I am down to 19 turkeys. I have 8 toms and 11 hens.

I have given away a couple Toms to a few nice people that I communicate with in my area and were looking to buy a tom. I gifted them a turkey. I have 2 people wanting to buy some of my Toms, so I will sell a few more and will put the remaining Toms in the freezer. With my luck, this year's hatching will yield 95% males.

Although, I have too many males, I can say that I do not have an infertility problems with the eggs. All eggs have been hatching. I set another 12 in the bator Sunday night, so I will see what happens with those.

 

[Arielle]

IMO infertility issues happen with two males, when one cannot dominate, or is having to protect his girls and doesn't get time to do his other job. THat is the reason for odd numbers of males in groups.

I looked over the sweetgrass yesterday-- looks like two hens anad a tom !! NOw to put hands on him and feel for the beard.

Out to check waters-- getting colder and colder this week. I put out raked up leaves for them to walk on.THey seem to like scratching in the leaves. GLad to have hot water piped outside!!

 

[kuntrygirl]

I tried to capture a pic at night of where my turkeys roost at night. These are horrible pics because it is night time, so please excuse the bad pics. I'm lucky that I don't have predators in my area.

 

[chicken pickin]

I was curious, a few of your were talking about feed earlier. I know it varies from place to place. But I recently decided to go with a multi flock for all my differnt stages of chickens and turkeys. Blue seal carries 3 stages of multi flock. game starter 28%, starter grower 22%, and breeder 18%. I currently am feeding the starter/grower pellets to all the chickens and turkeys. But is that ok? is it too high of protein for the chickens. Also should I soon switch to the breeder for the turkeys(they are 7 months)? and if so is the breeder ok for the chickens? The blue seal brochure says multi flock is good for all life stages of the entire flock. Does this seem ok to feed all my birds, and can the roosters and toms eat the breeder rations because of the calcium in it?

 

[kuntrygirl]

Ok, I took pics last night of the darkest colored poult and the light poult that I was talking about on yesterday. Here goes..............

Light Colored Poult:

Dark Colored Poult:

Poults Together

Celie, do you think it's possible to have sex linked Turkeys? That is an excellent topic of discussion that you brought up. I never thought about that. :/

Anyone else find light colored poults in their bunch?

I tried to get a few pic of the light colored hens but one of they were flying in the tree to roost, so I couldn't get a good pic, so I will try again today after work.

 

[kuntrygirl]

I weighed the poults last night and their weights range from 1.6 oz (the newly hatched poults a few days ago) to 4.6 oz (the first poult to hatch). And then the weights staggered as did the hatches.

I will try to weigh weekly to see what they are averaging each week as far as weight gain. They are currently on 30% protein game bird Startena feed. It costs about $18.50 for a 50lb bag. They will be on this for several months.

 

[kuntrygirl]

I was curious, a few of your were talking about feed earlier. I know it varies from place to place. But I recently decided to go with a multi flock for all my differnt stages of chickens and turkeys. Blue seal carries 3 stages of multi flock. game starter 28%, starter grower 22%, and breeder 18%. I currently am feeding the starter/grower pellets to all the chickens and turkeys. But is that ok? is it too high of protein for the chickens. Also should I soon switch to the breeder for the turkeys(they are 7 months)? and if so is the breeder ok for the chickens? The blue seal brochure says multi flock is good for all life stages of the entire flock. Does this seem ok to feed all my birds, and can the roosters and toms eat the breeder rations because of the calcium in it? 

22% is ok. I would be comfortable feeding 22% to my chickens. I currently feed the 26% protein to all of my birds but I do add a little cracked corn to try to decrease the protein for the chickens, ducks and geese. If my memory serves me correct, I add enough corn to decrease it to 20 or 22% protein. The guy at the feed store that makes their own feed helped me with the percentages. The turkeys frequent one certain feeder and they dominate that feeder, so I put the straight 26% protein feed in that feeder. If I could find 30% protein pellets in my area, I would be ALL OVER THAT feed.

For turkeys, I would be hesitant going to 18% protein if you don't have to but that's just me. I personally see a difference in turkeys when they are on lower protein feed as opposed to higher protein feed. Just my personal observations when I see other people's turkeys and they feed their turkeys much lower protein. I know that every area does not sell the higher protein and many people have to go with what they have and that's still ok.

I don't know what "extras" are in the "breeder" feed. I have never used a "breeder" feed and I have not had any problems with turkeys breeding. I have always had VERY successful hatches using non-breeder feed. But if the breeder feed can offer more and has more advantages to using it, then do go ahead and feed it. Your turkeys will still be ok on 18% protein. You shouldn't have any worries at all.

You will hear some people say roosters and toms should not have the breeder (or extra calcium) but I think it's a personal choice. I have not had a problem with my roosters or toms eating Lay pellets MANY years ago when I fed that to them. There were never any illnesses or death due to the feed.

Anyone else want to chime in and add anything?

 

[chicken pickin]

Thanks! I think I will stay on the 22% for everyone and just provide oyster shell for all the layers like im doing now. I put a dish of oyster shell in with the turkey hens, they will eat that also like the chickens hens correct? So I have so many questions lol. But this thread is great and is helping me with all the little things I havent been able to find else where.