I want to run this by you all before we do it. I have been wanting to get turkeys for almost 2 years, and we were so lucky that our feed store just happened to have some! They are Broad Breasted White turkeys and will be ready for slaughter around Thanksgiving. Right now I don't know what sex they are or how old they are, but I imagine that they are all hens and that they are a few weeks old since they are almost completely feathered, and have done well in the shade of the garage without a heat lamp at night in a brooder. (We are in Louisiana).
Here,Thankfully, our biggest predators are our own dogs who think birds are toys. I say thankfully, because they ward off other predators and we are able to keep the birds safe from the dogs. We plan to free range the turkeys with the chickens once they have grown a bit. They won't be able to sta much longer in the brooder and I propose this housing solution with materials I have on hand.
We have 4 of these turkeys and from what I read online they need about 10x10 per bird. To start off we would be able to make a 16x16 cattle panel pen wrapped in chicken wire to keep little turkeys in. Later we can bend some of the panels and add another one to create a 20x20 area if the 16x16 gets too small. I can then use another cattle panel and tarp to make a hoop shealter which would create a shady spot. This would also be easily moved around the yard like a tractor, but the biggest concern would be that there would be no roof for the enclosure, but as I said before we have never had any aerial predator issues, but I can't think of a roof for this type of setup.
We have cattle panels, pattet wood, some other boards, chicken wire, tin panels and tarps. Can you think of a way to make a roof or a lid on the pen that we could remove and replace whenever we needed to access the area?
Maybe a 20x20 wood frame covered in chicken wire to sit atop the panels?
Here,Thankfully, our biggest predators are our own dogs who think birds are toys. I say thankfully, because they ward off other predators and we are able to keep the birds safe from the dogs. We plan to free range the turkeys with the chickens once they have grown a bit. They won't be able to sta much longer in the brooder and I propose this housing solution with materials I have on hand.
We have 4 of these turkeys and from what I read online they need about 10x10 per bird. To start off we would be able to make a 16x16 cattle panel pen wrapped in chicken wire to keep little turkeys in. Later we can bend some of the panels and add another one to create a 20x20 area if the 16x16 gets too small. I can then use another cattle panel and tarp to make a hoop shealter which would create a shady spot. This would also be easily moved around the yard like a tractor, but the biggest concern would be that there would be no roof for the enclosure, but as I said before we have never had any aerial predator issues, but I can't think of a roof for this type of setup.
We have cattle panels, pattet wood, some other boards, chicken wire, tin panels and tarps. Can you think of a way to make a roof or a lid on the pen that we could remove and replace whenever we needed to access the area?
Maybe a 20x20 wood frame covered in chicken wire to sit atop the panels?
