Different colored turkey poults and how to breed them

[Cayde]

Hello! Just some questions about my turkeys I have three bronze turkeys 1 Tom and 2 hens. I’ve collected and incubated the eggs from both hens all the poults look like bronze poults then I have just one that looks like a Royal Palm poults. How is this? And what can I do from here to make more royal palms tia!

 

[SavKel&RynKel]

From what I am understanding of your post, you have 1 Royal Palm hen? You could just buy a Royal Palm Tom and keep the two pairs in separate enclosures?

 

[R2elk]

Hello! Just some questions about my turkeys I have three bronze turkeys 1 Tom and 2 hens. I’ve collected and incubated the eggs from both hens all the poults look like bronze poults then I have just one that looks like a Royal Palm poults. How is this? And what can I do from here to make more royal palms tia!

Please post images. While a newly hatched Royal Palm poult looks white, so do white poults. You have to wait awhile before a Royal palm poult starts developing some of its black coloring.

Sometimes turkeys carry hidden recessive color genes that can show up in the offspring if it receives the gene from each parent. The other possibility is that your "Bronze" turkeys are not actually Bronze turkeys.

 

[graciel57]

Like R2elk says, you might be looking at white or a palm type. Just can't tell too early. Give them a few weeks, like five or six, and you'll know for sure. If these are heritage type bronzes they could be either very easily. If they Broad Breasted bronzes, they are most likely white.

You'll have to know what you've got before anyone can tell you exactly what the breeding would have to be. Palms have more genes involved in their colour than any of the normal turkey colours. White can be anything and it's just one recessive gene involved. If it turns out to be white, then breed back to the parent and you'll get more white 50% of the time. If it actually is a palm, you have a much slimmer chance of breeding one back so quickly. BTW, notice I said "palm" and not "Royal Palm". You need the Narragansett gene to create a Royal Palm as opposed to a Calico or Sweetgrass type. That's actually three genes you need to line up for a Royal Palm.

Good luck with the poults, in any case. Turkeys are such fun and their genetics are much easier to understand and work with than chickens.

 

[R2elk]

You need the Narragansett gene to create a Royal Palm as opposed to a Calico or Sweetgrass type.

Royal Palm (b1b1 cgcg nn) and Calico (b1b1 cgcg nn Rr) both have the Narragansett gene but Sweetgrass (b1b1 cgcg) does not have the Narragansett gene.

 

[graciel57]

I don't know that I consider Calico a particular colour, more as a type of look. With modifiers, you're going to have a hard time with some birds knowing if red is in them or not.

When I started turkey feather colour close to 20 years ago, Calicos were just a tricolour turkey and I tend to still think of them that way.

 

[R2elk]

I don't know that I consider Calico a particular colour, more as a type of look. With modifiers, you're going to have a hard time with some birds knowing if red is in them or not.

When I started turkey feather colour close to 20 years ago, Calicos were just a tricolour turkey and I tend to still think of them that way.

You can see the current information for Calico turkeys. Calico is not the same as Sweetgrass.