Turkeys tormenting hens

[Steve_of_sandspoultry]

Turkeys aren't really flock birds they are gang related.

Everybody loves a turkey

Steve

 

[kuntrygirl]

Quote:

Steve said it all. GANG related. You're right about that.

 

[ivan3]

The secret is to let the turkey run share a common fence with the chicken run. Our chooks were raised with BBB poults, one of which survived with spraddle leg until 4 months of age. The chooks controlled the yard (and were inured to turks) when the heritage jakes and jennies were introduced and that `new meat' was subsequently `schooled' by the cockerel and a particularly aggressive BSL pullet.

Five years on and the turks still clear a path for those same chooks. We'd never let these particular chooks and turks to share a common run because the turks would beat themselves silly against the fences trying to avoid those growling, hackle happy hens and roo. Wouldn't allow any chooks and turks to share the same run (jakes/toms like to spar and could cause inadvertant injury to chooks, turkey hens can be pretty unpredictable). Ours range together with little problem but if the turks are dirt bathing, the chooks will usurp the spot, if the turks are eating a big pile of pecan weevil larvae the chooks will run them off and finish the pile themselves.

Turks have their own shed, chooks have their own coop.

Our turkey hens ganged up to attack and eat snakes, or to beat up on the low tom in the pecking order.

 

[PatS]

I wish that were the case here, Ivan. They have 2 acres to range and the turks are still ganging up on the hens. Up until a few weeks ago, the hens were in charge. Alas, no longer. Maybe if we had a really old roo... ours are the same age as the turks.

 

[ivan3]

Keep the turks penned when the chooks are out (or let a few out at a time when you are there to monitor - might be able to identify a ringleader). Maybe a week of that will `break the pattern'.

Your 4 jakes should start occupying themselves with one another (if they haven't already) pretty soon now.

Best of luck!

 

[boxermom]

My BR are doing that too. I have 13 from this year's hatch. They are a gang!

My breeders from last year are not in that group, just the young ones. I have left them all together though. None of the chickens look individually picked on. We are just biding our time until Oct when the first 5 can go to "camp". The last 8 were from a nest that I had found and I couldn't let them go to waste. They won't be ready until Christmas. My year old tom is trying his best to keep them in line, but the younger tom is taller than he and there are just too many. Ole, my breeder tom will be glad when the "young whipper snappers" are gone.

 

[PatS]

Ivan,

You mean neck fighting and dragging each other around the yard by their dewlaps?

Even the girls get involved sometimes.

Haven't seen any mating behavior (unless it looks like fighting), When does that start?

They ARE a gang, Boxermom. Steve pegged that one perfectly.

 

[kuntrygirl]

Quote:
My girls are the WORST!!!! It's like kick boxing and Karate Kid in 3D!!! The girls are TERRIBLE !!!!!!!! They even fly on the backs of my barbado sheep and just ride them. I'm like, "WHAT is going on"?

 

[Pampered Hen]

Same goes on here! My two turkeys (5-month old pair of BRs) have turned into the mobsters of my mixed flock. They used to be perfectly integrated along with the hens until about a week ago when they started to torment my favorite hen above all!. Today, they focused on a second hen. Both harassed hens have recently begun to molt and I have a feeling this might be the trigger for the mobbing activity by the turkeys.
For now, I separated out the victimized hens, but I have a feeling the focus of the turkeys will shift to other hens as they will go into molt. So, the better solution for me would be to separate out the perpetrators but I don't have the infrastructure for that at the moment...

 

[ivan3]

Guess the difference here is that our turks were Cassie's gang (heavily imprinted on humans). She would call me when I was on my way home and tell me to roll down the windows, crank up the radio and honk on as I turned into the drive. She'd have the turks and chooks ranging down by the road and, when she'd hear the racket, would yell `bad thing!' and take off uphill through the woods towards the house and the chooks and turks would all be yelping and cackling and skirring above the ground trying to keep up with her (they don't go anywhere near the road, now).

The turks would go to roost in the trees and we were consistent about kicking them of the branches - liter soda bottle with hole in the bottom/rope ran through bottle (knotted above and below bottle at half-length of the rope) the rope would either be thrown over, or shot over with bow, branch where they would be peering down at us in the dark, cass would work one end of rope while I worked the other and the bottle would be steamrollered into the legs of the turks. They'd finally fly down into the circle of the spotlight left on, lying on the ground. They could then be picked up and carried off to their shed. This took about a month of work. One evening I walked out and saw Cass staring up into the trees, the turks started giving out with that three note `where's momma?' call and they flew down around her (all I could think of was `fly my pretties!'). Now they march off to their run/shed with no intervention.

Our jakes got serious with their sparring at about five months. The following Feb. (spring time coming!) they put more effort into it but, for all that that martial effort, never did any permanent damage and only lasted for 3-5 days on average (though sometimes they'd go at it in the middle of the night).

An older tom/hen in residence (when new bunches arrive) would be helpful.

Gang behavior in the jakes and jennies? A good spray head on the hose or lockdown might be best.

That said, gang related behavior will continue. I posted a thread about this a couple years ago: https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=40700&p=1

Good luck and, or, good eating

, to you all!