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Keeping a bird is a serious matter. Anyone who started raising poultry on small farms or at home, faced with the question of whether it is possible to keep chickens and turkeys together. The answer to this question is rather ambiguous, in our article we will try to explain why.
Turkey maintenance
When breeding a bird, a lot depends on its breed. A domestic turkey is very unpretentious in maintenance, as is a mixture of it with a thoroughbred bird, but an imported bird requires more attention and comprehensive care.
As you know, turkey meat is very healthy, it contains vitamin K and folic acid. It is well absorbed, does not cause allergies, is dietary. A turkey egg is superior to a chicken egg in many ways. Breeding turkeys at home is a rather complicated and troublesome business. It is not surprising that meat is highly valued on the market. The need for it is also growing every year, so it is extremely profitable to open turkey farms today.
If we compare chickens and turkeys, the latter gain weight faster, and approximately 60% of adult poultry meat is a low-cholesterol dietary product.
Conditions of detention
The turkey is a very large bird. When choosing or building a poultry house, this must be taken into account. Below is a table of bird parameters.
| Type of parameter | For turkeys | For turkeys |
|---|---|---|
| Adult bird weight | 9-35 kg | 4-11 kg |
| Weight gain | 7-8 months | 4-5 months |
| The basis of nutrition | Feedstuffs | Feedstuffs |
The fastest growing bird in the courtyard is just a turkey. This plus successfully compensates for the difficulties in keeping this bird. Turkeys (especially young ones) are demanding on the following conditions:
- to the duration of daylight hours up to 12-13 hours;
- to the absence of drafts;
- to cleanliness in the poultry house and disinfection of feeders;
- to nutrition.
As for the last point, it is important to note here: turkeys should not be fed in the same way as chickens. This is a common mistake made by inexperienced breeders. You can use a special table where it is written exactly how a turkey should eat.
| Age of the bird | What to feed |
|---|---|
| 2 days | hard boiled egg, millet |
| 3 days | add boiled carrots, finely chopped |
| 4 days | add chopped greens |
| week | introduce powdered milk and cottage cheese in a small amount |
| 2 week | introduce additional fish and meat and bone meal |
Too many greens can not be entered.
A grown bird should have in its diet:
- wheat;
- barley;
- crushed corn;
- wheat bran (as a rule, in the basis of wet mash).
Also, do not ignore mineral supplements. Turkey poults must be kept warm, they can die from hypothermia. When keeping chickens and turkeys together, the nutritional balance of the bird can be disturbed. Let’s talk about the conditions of keeping chickens and find out how similar they are.
You can watch a good video about keeping turkeys below:
Keeping chickens
Keeping chickens is more familiar to our farmers. As a rule, there are practically no difficulties in this matter. This popular bird is grown for delicious meat and eggs, which are consumed in large quantities by the inhabitants of our country.
Laying hens bring up to 200 eggs per year each. Chickens also love warmth, so poultry houses are specially prepared for winter. The optimum temperature for year-round maintenance is + 23-25 degrees. Speaking of chickens, the breed of the bird and its purpose are also of great importance. The nutrition of chickens, especially if they are fattened for meat, is represented by more fatty feeds. Their diet includes:
- corn and oats (rich in fat);
- pumpkin, corn, carrots, fish oil, sprouted oats, weeds (rich in vitamins);
- chalk, shell rock, egg shells (for calcium enrichment).
Chickens are fed 3-4 times a day, giving only grain at night. During the cold season, the amount of grain is also increased so that the bird is not too fat.
Chickens are often attacked by mites, lice, fleas and other insect pests. If you do not process the chicken coop and do not keep it clean, the livestock can be destroyed. The maintenance of chickens implies the arrangement of ash baths. Under them, convenient boxes are used with a special mixture of:
- ash;
- sand;
- dry clay.
Mix these components in equal parts. Chickens take such baths on their own, they benefit and get rid of parasites that spread the infection. You can additionally familiarize yourself with some rules for keeping chickens using the example of laying hens by watching the video below:
Opening any professional literature on keeping poultry, you will definitely come across a recommendation not to keep turkeys and chickens together. When it comes to home maintenance, here are my recommendations. When organizing a farm for doing business, you need to approach the issue more seriously and professionally.
General recommendations
When opening a farm, the main task is to minimize risks as much as possible. Each bird is a farmer’s income, which no one wants to lose. Of course, with home breeding, everything is much simpler.
Turkeys do not like either heat or cold, they need to be bred based on this data. Ideally, if such a bird has two poultry houses at once: summer and winter. Summer should be well ventilated, and winter should be warm and bright. When keeping turkeys and chickens together, the differences are taken into account:
- in nutrition;
- in content;
- in common diseases.
The larger the turkey, the more space it needs when placed. When growing turkeys on farms, they try to separate females from males. This makes it easier to keep track of bird egg production. The same rule applies to laying hens. Order on the farm is the key to rapid business development.
Let’s talk about why they still do not recommend keeping different birds together. This applies not only to those listed above. Chickens, turkeys, ducks and guinea fowls should all be housed separately if it is to be kept properly.
Problems when co-housing different birds
Sooner or later, every farmer will run into problems if chickens, turkeys and other poultry are kept together. It all depends on various factors:
- breeds;
- placement conditions;
- the number of heads;
- farmer care opportunities.
According to reviews, problems can be avoided if the farm is small, or when poultry houses are settled at home, where control over chickens and turkeys is maximum.
What are the problems to watch out for?
- Improper diet. When turkeys are kept together with chickens, the former can excessively accumulate fat, suffer at an early age from an abundance of grass, and so on.
- Aggressive behavior. Some breeds of turkeys can be aggressive towards chickens, slaughter young animals. This requires the separation of the birds, since it is possible to lose a large part of the population. In this case, many farmers recommend growing turkeys with chickens from an early age, but no one will give an absolute guarantee that there will be no aggression from a larger bird.
- disease. For turkeys, diseases of chickens are dangerous and vice versa. When an infection (for example, histomonosis or enterohepatitis) passes from turkeys to chickens, it will be extremely difficult to cure the latter. If we are talking about young animals, then you can lose the entire brood. Chicken manure is also dangerous for turkeys. This reason is the most important in recommending not to keep different birds together.
- Turkeys can crush chicken eggs in nests. If this happens, the farmer will have to urgently separate the bird, which is sometimes very difficult to do.
That is why veterinarians recommend at the initial stage to equip the farm in accordance with all the rules. Chickens and turkeys are very demanding in terms of care and maintenance. The risk of infection with viruses and death due to improper nutrition is extremely high.
If you open a professional farm, remember: the veterinary service will not issue an opinion on it if you plan to jointly walk various birds, fatten and live. Such keeping of chickens and turkeys is an exception, when it is simply not possible otherwise at home.
Feedback on the joint content of chickens and turkeys
Some farmers keep poultry together at home. Consider their recommendations.
Conclusion
Thus, every farmer should think about keeping chickens and turkeys in advance in order to avoid further problems.