Turkeys Gone Broody

[nivtup]

So, we have had three hens go off nesting. We think one was taken by a predator.

The other two emerged yesterday.

Our Black hen came off the nest with 9 poults, and the red hen cam offf the nest with 11 poults.

Way more than we ever expected.

They are all from a mixed color flock, so there is lots of variety.

Now, another Red hen has gone off somewhere.

 

[Harp Turkey Ranch]

what kind of mixes you getting from those guys ??

you letting them breed all mixed up or ???

You never know on your other hen she might just come out soon with her own ???

 

[nivtup]

Well, not a good start to the morning. It seems one of the hens got confused and didn't do to well over night with the poults. That and the toms got in on top of them resulted in a bad scene earlier. We had to take the poults, and it looks like we might save 7 of 12. Both cold and looks like they had been trampled by Toms fighting.

The black hen is doing well, except near fences. The poults go through, and she gets confused. We will have to watch very closely over the coming week and decide if we might have to take them also. I hope not, because brooders are pretty tight around here as it is.

Anyhoot, we are seeing a mix of red, black, and red/black for the most part. The turkeys are running together. We had built pens to seperate and ended up throwing chickens in the pens instead.

We will be very careful on what we keep if any of these poults. I am sure they will still make a good table bird

 

[Struttn1]

I have poults just like them. Mine are out of Bourbon Red tom and Black Spanish hen.

 

[mrszlopez]

well at least you got some babies out of a broody turkey hen !
my hen went off for almost two & a half months, made a big nest
with about 10 eggs ( plus 3 chicken eggs ) & mustve forgotten she
didnt have a boyfriend. We finally broke her about 3 weeks ago.
but we will have two surprises for her this summer !! we bought
babiess ! but congrats on the babies & sorry about the hen taken
by a predator & the injured babies

 

[Struttn1]

Here are some pics of my BR/BS mutts.

 

[nivtup]

OK, an update to the story.

The red hen was mad, and I mean mad. She was looking everywhere for the babies, and managed to get over by the black hen.

The fight was on.

We quickly got three of the poults from the brooder, and managed to get them seperated, and re-introduced the poults to the hen.

She is much much happier, and so are we. She took them off towards the nest, so this time we are hoping for better results.

The toms are penned up, they seem to be the real culprits in the havoc that we found this morning. If all goes well we might try to give her back a few more.

Those photos look exaclty like what several of the poults look like.


Edited for spelling

 

[chickenannie]

I would pen up a single mom with her poults and feed them high-protein if you want them to do well. It's very easy to lose all the poults for the reasons you stated -- 2 hens fighting, tom getting in the way and squashing poults, cats and other predators etc. Those poults are valuable too.

 

[Harp Turkey Ranch]

yeah you'll need to keep the toms out of the pens with the hens or keep them away from them or they will kill all of them

I was hoping that you keep them by the breed as i wanted to see what Tom's pure bred turkeys would have looked like, when they were breed back to each other

Good luck on your new poults !!!!

The golden cuckoos I got from you are all doing great and they are getting some great coloring in them.