Roughly how much do turkeys eat?

[cupman]

My chickens and guineas are becoming quite a hassle. They all want to sleep in trees or fly into the neighbor's yard and I am thinking of switching to turkeys because they are so much easier to manage and I really like turkeys. I go through roughly 100lbs of flock raiser every week and it's starting to get kind of expensive. I was really hoping to start a small flock of maybe 8 turkeys next year and just leaving it at that. I plan on getting heritage breed turkeys but probably not midget whites. I'm under the impression it would be cheaper to feed 8 turkeys than 3 turkeys, 3 guineas and 35 chickens. Around here flock raiser is costing me $19.50/50lbs and game bird feed is about $20 or $21 for 50 pounds.. so there isn't much of a price difference.

How much would you guess turkeys eat in a day or week or any given time? I'm just trying to figure out about how much feed I'd need to give them. I have 2.5 acres and I let my birds free range so the turkeys would be able to forage during the day.

 

[ivan3]

http://albc-usa.org/downloads.html

Check out chapter 4.

 

[Oregon Blues]

Well, for one thing, heritage turkeys fly a lot better than your chickens do. So if you don't want birds that fly up onto the top of your house, onto your car, and into the trees, maybe you should think harder about turkeys.

 

[Arielle]

Well, for one thing, heritage turkeys fly a lot better than your chickens do. So if you don't want birds that fly up onto the top of your house, onto your car, and into the trees, maybe you should think harder about turkeys.

You beat me to it Oregon BLues!!!

My bourbon reds fly just fine when they want to.


Maybe you could teach them, the chickens and guineas, to sleep in the coop at night; train with grain. My chickens go to the coop every night like clockwork. It is my turkeys who prefer to roost outside for the night. I gave up trying to get them into a coop at night.

If I might suggest, stick to your chickens. THey can eat a lot of table scraps which I don't find my turkeys doing. Chickens eat almost anything. Maybe you can reduce your feed bill that way. Just a suggestion.

 

[Reyort]

Why not just get a heavier breed of chickens? My orpingtons only fly 3 feet into the air on rare occasion. You might just need a new breed of chicken rather than a larger bird that can fly farther and higher than any chicken.

 

[allmypeeps]

I have 40 free ranging bantams, 4 guineas and 4 turkeys...the chickens put themselves in at dusk meanwhile the guineas and turkey refuse to go in and sleep way up in a pine tree despite my efforts to keep them in their coop... i put grain in at night and they go in, scarf it all up- then go outside and lay in a pile on the ground NEXT to the darn coop or on top of it if has gotten too dark to find a tree...wind and rain does nothing to tempt them to use their coop...dumb dumb birds!

I definately prefer turkey over guineas though as my guineas are too tame and follow us around the yard blaring at the top of their lungs at us...i have to actually spray them with the hose and even then they dont go away! They perch up on our porch all day and will waltz right in the house if they have the chance. VERY annoying....the turkey and chickens follow us too, but they dont squawk annoyingly at the top of their lungs like the dang guineas do!

 

[Arielle]

One of my turkeys is sitting on my porch railing tonight.

 

[Lagerdogger]

I didn't read chapter 4 (sorry Ivan, painfully slow internet here), but my rule of thumb is that heritage birds grow at about a 5:1 raio for the first six months, and BB birds go closer to 3:1. In other words, to raise a heritage turkey to 25 lb so it dresses out at about 18 lb takes about 125 lbs of feed, and 6 or 7 months, while a broad-breasted bird will reach the same weight on about 75 lbs of feed in about 4 or 4 1/2 months.

 

[ivan3]

Lagerdogger wrote: I didn't read chapter 4 (sorry Ivan, painfully slow internet here), but my rule of thumb is that heritage birds grow at about a 5:1 raio for the first six months, and BB birds go closer to 3:1. In other words, to raise a heritage turkey to 25 lb so it dresses out at about 18 lb takes about 125 lbs of feed, and 6 or 7 months, while a broad-breasted bird will reach the same weight on about 75 lbs of feed in about 4 or 4 1/2 months.

I understand, completely (hated dialup and sat.): Thanks for posting the rule of thumb!. This is the ALBC info: As the chart was `borrowed' from Marsden, et al.(Turkey Management not available for free) I ran him down: His extended pamphlet (for USDA back in `52) `Turkey Raising, Stanley Marsden, is available for free download in multiple formats (pdf included) from Google Books. Some more info for those who are looking for specifics: Not much has changed (though I'll forego dosing the turks with sodium fluoride for lice and take the phenothiazine myself if our turks get Blackhead...)

 

[Catfish267]

I clip the chickens wings and they don't fly more than 2 feet off the ground. All you have to do is hang em upside down and just clip off a little bit on one side. It doesn't hurt them.