Content
Against the background of the chicken population walking around the villages, a native of the North American continent - the turkey - is completely lost. The low popularity of turkeys as poultry is most likely explained by the low egg production of turkeys (120 eggs per year is considered a good result) and the long period of raising turkeys.
With the exception of broilers, other turkeys take approximately six months to reach market weight. Broiler meat crosses of turkeys, like broiler chickens, grow in 3 months.
In addition, many owners of private farms believe that keeping turkeys is associated with significant difficulties. In fact, this is both true and false.
Keeping turkeys at home is generally no more difficult than keeping chickens. True, we must take into account that the area for keeping one turkey is much larger.
Usually, when planning to get a bird, they buy not adults, but eggs for the incubator or chicks. Without experience in hatching turkey eggs, it is better to buy turkey poults.
Raising turkeys at home
It is generally accepted that turkey poults are very capricious when raised and often die at a very young age. This is also one of the reasons why poultry farmers are reluctant to take up raising turkeys at home.
In fact, the problem lies not in the pampering of turkey poults, but... in industrial hatchery complexes. Unfortunately, these giant incubators are constantly plagued by infections. Epizootics sometimes take such forms that the import of chicks from the country that spreads the infection is closed at the state level. Experienced goose breeders, for example, point out that when purchasing goslings from a large complex, up to 60% of the new goslings die from viral enteritis in the first three weeks of life.
Hatchery turkey poults have similar problems. Often the entire purchased batch may die out. From infection. At the same time, the survival rate of home-grown uninfected turkey poults is almost one hundred percent with minimal attention to them. Those that do die raise doubts even when hatching from the egg, since they clearly hatch too early and a very large undigested yolk is noticeable in the egg. Such a turkey poult is very likely to die.
The second reason for the death of hatchery turkey poults is the conviction of private owners that in the first days of life, young chickens (of any type) must be given eggs and boiled millet. Today, there are ready-made feeds for young chickens, turkeys and others, which contain the amount of protein, carbohydrates, vitamins and minerals that chicks need in the first days of life.
At the complex, no one will boil millet and eggs for hatched turkey poults and then rub them. They will give you special feed.When a private owner, according to the precepts of experienced chicken breeders, begins to shove millet and eggs into the turkey poult, the turkey poult, unaccustomed to such food, will receive gastrointestinal upset, diarrhea and, as a result, death.
Therefore, when purchasing even raised turkey poults (this option is better than daily allowances) from private hands, you need to ask what the previous owners fed the bird, and, if necessary, change the diet, gradually adding a new type of food. When purchasing turkey poults from a large farm, it is better to think in advance about purchasing special feed for the young animals. Almost certainly this is the kind of food that was provided on such a farm.
And the third reason may be the long hunger strike of day-old turkey poults. On the first day, freshly hatched chicks of any bird do not eat anything; they have not yet absorbed all the yolk. On the second day they should already be able to bite. Moreover, if on the second day the turkey poults still eat very little, then from the third day onwards you only have time to add feed.
Breeding turkeys at home
For beginners, this is not such a difficult problem as many information resources often try to present it. The real problem is hereditary deformities due to inbreeding when breeding heavy breeds of turkeys, diseases brought from the incubator and the large weight of turkeys that were given too high perches.
Turkeys tolerate cold weather very well, even if it rains and hails. At temperatures from +5 (it feels like minus 5 due to the wind and rain), turkeys do just fine even without a canopy.If the turkey’s wings have not yet been clipped, then he will generally not notice the bad weather. But turkeys fly very well if you give them the opportunity. Yes, appearances are deceiving. With clipped wings, a turkey cannot soften its landing and injures its legs upon landing.
At the same time, one should not expect that turkeys are able to spend the night outside at real sub-zero temperatures. If there is frost in the region in winter, then turkeys need an insulated barn. When equipping the shelter, it is necessary to take into account the size of the turkeys. Although the principles of a turkey coop are the same as a chicken coop, the area should be much larger.
Turkeys can be kept with other poultry. Despite its formidable appearance, the turkey is a peace-loving creature. They fight either with relatives for turkeys, or driving strangers away from the one sitting on nest turkeys In all other cases, the turkey prefers not to provoke conflicts.
Turkeys are excellent mothers and sit well on the nest. True, not without some foolishness. If a turkey decides that he will nest “here,” then he will nest “here.” And it is almost impossible to dissuade the turkey from this thought. Even bathing the turkey in a barrel of cold water doesn't help much. So it’s easier to accept it and let the turkey hatch (or not hatch) the clutch where she decided to lay eggs.
It is possible to correct this point. Turkeys prefer to hatch poults in secluded places. Given the choice between a corner hidden from indiscretion and an open box with straw, the turkey will choose the corner.
If you provide enough hiding places, turkeys are more likely to lay their eggs there.
Beginners usually start raising turkeys by purchasing poults and raising them.
How to raise turkeys
If you purchased raised, fledged turkey poults, you can release them into the aviary. It is better to find out how they were fed by the previous owner and first copy the diet, and then switch them to your own food.
Day-old turkey poults are first placed in brooders or improvised containers in which it is possible to maintain a high air temperature.
Beginner poultry farmers usually do not yet have either incubators or brooders. In the summer, even such a box may be suitable.
Bedding is placed at the bottom: sawdust, straw, hay.
A stick of suitable length is placed on top, on which a wire from a heating lamp is wound. For heating, a 40-watt lamp will be enough, but the lamp needs an old model, that is, an ordinary incandescent light bulb.
It is usually recommended to maintain the temperature at about 30-33 degrees, but in reality 28 is enough. Without a thermometer, you can select the desired temperature by simply lowering or raising the lamp.
You need to focus on the behavior of the turkey poults and the lamp itself. The indicated 40 watts can heat the glass so that it burns, or so that the lamp can be safely held with your bare hand. Therefore, we look at the turkey poults.
If they huddle together, try to get into the middle of the herd and squeak, it means they are cold. The lamp is lowered lower or replaced with a more powerful one.
If the turkey poults are huddled together next to/under the lamp, but are sleeping peacefully, it means that the temperature regime suits them.
If the turkey poults are located at some distance from the lamp and are sitting quietly, many are sleeping, which means that it is already too hot for them under the lamp, and the lamp can be raised higher or replaced with a less powerful one.
But at the same time, the box must be covered from above so that the heat does not escape. Therefore, ventilation holes need to be cut in the box.
Feeding turkey poults from day one
The best and simplest thing is special food for turkey poults, to which everything necessary is added. By the way, considering that all the ingredients in it are ground into dust and then pressed again into grains, sand is not even required when feeding this food.
There is no need to simply pour food into the bottom of the box. The food is poured into a shallow and low container. The turkey poults themselves will find it very well on the second day.
Feeding and characteristics of turkey poults
If it is not possible to buy such food, then you will have to feed it the old fashioned way, be sure to add grated boiled egg for the first week. The number of eggs will largely depend on the number of poults and the financial viability of the owners.
In addition to eggs, they give finely ground wheat, barley, and oats. But finely ground, not flour. Sand must be placed in a separate bowl. Ground boiled eggshells are added to the cereal. After a week, you can gradually add finely chopped greens, including vegetables and ordinary herbs.
In addition to cereals, turkeys can be given soaked bran and deer. But in this case, you need to make sure that these feeds do not sour in the heat, since they have a high ability to ferment.These types of feed are soaked immediately before feeding. Feed should not be liquid.
Clean water is also a must. Water can also be placed simply in a container low enough for the turkeys to drink, and high enough so that they cannot fit into it when simply moving around the box.
The bottoms of cut-off one-and-a-half or two-liter bottles work well as such containers. But you need to put some kind of weight at the bottom of the container with water so that the turkey poults don’t knock it over. The weighting agent at the bottom of the container with water is also necessary so that a turkey that accidentally gets into it can jump out without any problems. A very wet turkey poult may die from hypothermia.
This kind of density is unacceptable if you need to save the entire population and not lose 25 percent.
With such density, especially if we are talking about turkey poults less than a week old, weak turkey poults can be trampled by stronger ones when they lie down to rest.
In addition, for normal development, turkey poults must move a lot. Otherwise, turkey poults will inevitably have problems with their legs.
But it is better if turkey poults have the opportunity to move a lot from birth. It’s good when turkey poults huddled together occupy only one corner of the area allotted to them. As the turkey poults grow, they need to be seated or moved to a larger area.
Details about raising turkeys at home
Puberty in turkeys occurs at 10 months.Therefore, turkey poults purchased at the beginning of summer are already quite capable of breeding in the spring. For one turkey leave 8-10 turkeys. Larger quantities are not recommended as the turkey will not be able to effectively fertilize all the turkeys.
If turkeys are kept not on an industrial scale, but simply as an additional source of meat in the farmstead, you need to allocate at least 3-4 turkeys to the turkey.
When a turkey decides on a place where it will nest, it begins to lay eggs directly on the bare ground. A turkey lays one egg per day. There is no need to worry about bare ground. Along with the eggs, a nest appears there, quite unnoticeably, often made from whatever the turkey was able to find. Therefore, provide the turkeys with straw scattered around the enclosure. The turkeys will assemble the straw nest themselves.
Having laid 25-28 eggs, the turkey sits down to incubate them. The turkey sits very tightly on the nest, often without even going to peck at the food. If the turkeys were fed well enough before and the turkey has some fat reserves (the turkey should not be obese), then there is nothing to worry about. In the first days of incubation, the turkey usually calmly leaves the nest. The turkey stops leaving the nest in the last days before the chicks hatch.
The turkey incubates for 28 days. After which you can decide whether to take the turkey poults and raise them by hand, or leave them with the turkey.In the second case, the turkey and poults must be provided with appropriate food and care must be taken to ensure that other birds do not eat it.
How to raise turkeys in a household incubator
Turkey poults can also be bred in a household incubator if a decision was made not to leave eggs under the turkey or an incubator egg was purchased. In addition, incubator-raised turkeys generally do not have the brooding instinct, so it is possible that hatchery turkeys will not incubate eggs either.
Eggs that have been stored for no more than 10 days are selected for placement in the incubator. Eggs should be clean, but not washed. Store eggs at a temperature of 12 degrees and a humidity of 80% with the blunt end up. The eggs are turned every 4 days.
Before laying, the egg shells are cleaned of debris, wait until the eggs warm up to room temperature, and are dipped in a disinfectant solution. After which the eggs are checked with an ovoscope.
The yolk of a quality egg has no clear boundaries, the white is transparent, and the air chamber is located at the blunt end of the egg. These eggs can be used for incubation.
Due to the mottled color and thicker film of the turkey egg, visibility will be poorer, but the basics can be seen.
Turkey eggs are ovoscopic for the second time 8 days after laying. And for the third time on the 26th day.
If any of these defects are present, the egg is removed from the incubator.
Ovoscoping at home:
Stages of incubation of turkey eggs
1-8 days:
- temperature 37.5 - 38°;
- humidity – 60 – 65%;
- number of egg turns – 6 per day.
8 – 14 days:
- temperature 37.5 - 38°;
- humidity – 45 – 50%;
- number of egg turns – 6 per day.
15 – 25 days:
- temperature 37.5°;
- humidity – 65%;
- number of egg turns – 4 per day;
- cooling the eggs - 10-15 minutes, at the end, when you touch the eyelid, you should not feel either cold or heat from the egg.
25 – 28 days: the eggs are not disturbed until the turkeys hatch.
Hatching will begin with small pecks of the egg shell. The eggs can remain in this position for up to a day. There is no need to try to help turkey poults open the egg. Having gained strength, the turkey poults will open the egg shell themselves and get out of it. If you “help” them, it may turn out that the turkey poults are not yet developed enough and there is too much yolk in the egg. When the egg shell is opened, the yolk will dry out, the turkey will not have time to develop to a viable state and will die.
DIY ovoscope
You can make a primitive ovoscope for eggs yourself from an ordinary lamp and some kind of box. For example, from under shoes. But in this case, the eggs will be less visible, since the lamp in the factory ovoscope is more powerful.
A hole the size of an egg is cut in the lid of the box, a switched-on lamp is placed inside the box and the lid is tightly closed. To be able to close the lid, a slot is cut in the side wall of the box for the wire.
It is better to ovoscope the eggs in complete darkness so that you can see them better.
Conclusion
As a result, there is no need to be afraid to own and raise turkeys. Keeping turkeys is more difficult only in terms of the amount of feed and the money spent on feed. But the meat yield is very high. Broiler turkeys provide even more meat, but require significantly more feed. And it is better to feed such turkeys with broiler feed.
