When do turkey hens lay eggs?

[FarmersHatchery]

I have a royal palm hen that is about 1 and a half years old. In the spring she sat on a small batch of 4 eggs and three of them hatched. With it being fall now, I figured she won't lay again until spring since I've always been told that turkeys will only lay eggs in the spring. However, she now has a nest of 5 fertile eggs. I've also seen my tom that is in with her breeding her, too. She is still laying eggs and I think she is going to broody. My question is, is it normal for turkeys to lay and hatch eggs this late in the year? Thanks!

 

[frank53061]

This is my First year raising Turkeys and mine are not old enough to lay yet.
I have read that mainly Spring and fall times with some in between when Turkey Hens lay.
If you got 3 out of 4 eggs hatched with the Hen thats 75% thats a good hatch rate and if she was a good mama and the Poults made it with out loosing any thats even better.
I dont know much about Royal Palms but most I have heard from reading here the Hen will lay several eggs with some time between times before the hen goes broody and will set on from 8 to 12 eggs just from the one Hen.
so 4 eggs and then going broody ? that may be normal for that breed.
If she is a constant good broody mom and raises her Poults well then keep allowing her to do so but if she starts loosing a high number of eggs and you dont want to loose them you might think about Incubating them yourself.
Come Spring my Hens will be old enough to lay and I hope I got some good Broody Moms if not I will Incubate them my self.

Good Luck

 

[Lagerdogger]

Going broody on just four eggs is a little light. Most hens seem to lay 8 to 15 or so. My Royal Palm this spring wouldn't go broody. At 19 eggs, I brought them in to an incubator. 20 eggs later I brought them in again. Then I let her go. She kept laying, made a nest that got predated, made a new nest, and finally went broody on 11 eggs. They just hatched yesterday. Two died, four lived, and three didn't hatch. (Yeah, I know that only adds up to 9. Don't know what happened to the other two eggs!).

Anyway, most of them lay in spring and then stop. If you take the eggs away, they will more eggs that if you let them go brody (the above case being an exception in more ways than one). Some start again for a short period in the fall. Laying all summer long is a bit unusual, but it happens.

 

[Lagerdogger]

Oh yeah...day length is what triggers spring laying, so people in Florida watch their turkeys lay eggs in January while up in Minnesota we don't get anything until mid-March. Actually, I'm not sure about the January thing, but I know I'm reading about nests in the south way before we're thinking of eggs in Minnesota.

What the heck happened to the edit button, anyway? Oh, it's a pencil now.

 

[Scottingitup]

My first season of laying started in early February. Most of my hens have stopped laying and are molting- I have one that still lays about every 3rd day now. She tried to go broody again but I took all of her eggs. 40 turkeys is enough for this year!

 

[Celie]

This is my first year hatching Holland White turkey eggs. My hens stated laying here in Louisiana in late February and out of 10 turkeys, I bought last year from a hatchery, only 2 are female. They each laid an egg almost every day, until about a month ago. I hatched them out in an incubator, with about 75% fertility rate and kept 25 for myself. They are all different ages and sizes now, but most look like they are going to be males, because they get blue in the face. Most are too young to gobble or bow up and dance. Does anyone know why more males would hatch than females? Now I am getting only one egg every once in a while. Could they be molting, or is it the days getting shorter? Will this year's hatchlings be old enough to lay by next spring? Summer? Could they stop like this and lay again this fall? How many eggs do turkeys lay in a year anyway? They each must have laid about 100 to 150 eggs. Thanks, Celie

 

[FarmersHatchery]

Thanks everyone for your help! The batch of 4 eggs was her first set of eggs ever, so I’m guessing that is why she didn’t lay on very many. Plus, she did have about 5 more to start out with, but my dogs ate those 5 within the first three days that she went broody before I realized that the dogs could get in there even. She has about 6 eggs now and is showing signs that she’ll sit on them when she gets happy with the number of eggs. I don’t want to take the eggs away from her so I get more, since I have no luck at all with incubators. I would put them under my broody chickens, but the turkey eggs are a bit big for my bantams. The bantam hens didn’t hatch any of the turkey eggs I put underneath them in the spring…anyways, thanks again everyone!

 

[Builderofempire]

We have two Narragansett one hen and tom. Everyone told us they dont lay until the spring. We had them for a month and let them in with the chickens. Soon as we did our hen started laying eggs in November. I also live in Missouri where it gets pretty cold. She is still laying and its December now. Every egg we have got from her has been fertile. We put em in our homemade incubator. I dont know if she is laying because they are mixed with the chickens or if its due to the fact we feed them so well.

 

[Arielle]

I wonder if first season turkey hens lay in the fall just like the chicken pullets often do. I have several pullets just start laying, though not all of them,

 

[allmypeeps]

I have spring narragansett turkeys about 8 months old now and its only 20 degrees here in Maine and I found an egg yesterday in their coop, Im pretty excited as I never had turkey as pets before (and was thinking I had all toms) so the egg was a surprise. Also my spring bantams are all laying even tho its winter and cold.. got 13 eggs yesterday and 12 the day before