Heritage Turkey raising

Today was one of those early fall days, misty and rainy.   We hung out at home and did our favorite homebody fall chores.  We moved and stacked our locust firewood,  mulched the vegtable  bed and planted garlic, and last but not least had a little bonfire.  It was nice to get our hands dirty for a change of pace.  What a nice weekend!!!
One of the big projects this year has been the turkeys.  Last spring we decided to do another batch of turkeys.   The reasoning behind 20 turkeys was we raised 6 last year and we so enjoyed cooking them in our la CAJA China  box, more turkeys, more get togethers.We are also selling some and traded a couple  away.  Blueberries for turkey works for me.   We are keeping 8 or 10 in the freezer.  Yummy.
This adventure has set us on a path of new and amusing perdicaments, none of which I am unhappy about.   

We got 20 turkey poults from McMurray Hatchery this July.  They earned my repeat business by their excellent customer service.    When one arrived dead and another 3/4 dead  they happily  returned the money for the two.

From Left to right, Black Spanish,  Midget White, and Bourbon Red about 13 weeks old 

  Anyway it was a mix and I thought I had received 5 white broadbreasted , and 5 bronze turkeys in the mix, but to my surprise the white ones were the smallest turkeys. Instead I got 5 Naragansetts, and 4 Midget White Turkeys, not to mention, 4 Black Spanish turkeys and 4 Bourbon Red turkeys.   Anyway, the turkeys  are  calm, friendly, and generally amusing.  The most friendly have been the Naragansetts, so today after cleaning their pen and giving them their squash leaves,  we decided  to keep one male and the two hens of the Naragansetts.  We would like to see if we can raise the poults.  Lets see , they will be 9 months April 14th, and maybe they will start laying then. 



From left to right, Bourbon Red , two Naragansetts

 Our set up is one  of those metal carports.  It is 24 by 24 and we have half of it set up for the turkeys.  They also have a 140 sq foot coop for roosting and eating in.    They are pretty happy in there, breezy, not to much sun in the summer, which is a trick here in Underwood.  The highlight of our morning is watching them joyously flap and fly when we let them out of their coop in the morning.    .

We feed them a mix of alfalfa and turkey feed, then any greenery we can.  Also bugs and worms when we can.

 So  improvements today were cleaning up all the uneaten vines, and the most exciting of all was the bamboo gutter leading into our 5 gallon bucket.  So now in the winter we can just expect rain water to fill our bucket from the run off from the roof, okay so it is little Dr Seussy, but oh my how fun.  Here are some pictures of the set up.  Now we have the inside and outside waterer, and the gutter running into the bucket.  The turkeys stay drier and hydrated without turning on the hose. This kills two birds with one stone, so to speak.

Water in the bucket

Happy water drops down to bucket

Needless to say we are pleased with our latest upgrade and our decision to keep three of the turkeys for next spring  breeding experiment.