Our Domestic Birds: Elementary Lessons in AvicultureRobinson, John H. (John Henry)
Science
Our Domestic Birds: Elementary Lessons in Aviculture
Robinson, John H. (John Henry)
Cage birds; Pigeons; Poultry
The turkey is almost exclusively a farm product. It is possible to grow
a few good turkeys in confinement, but this is rarely done except in
experimental work or by persons who grow a few for amusement and for an
opportunity to study some of their characteristics. A few adult turkeys
may be kept on a small farm and remain about the homestead as other
poultry does. The turkeys themselves may get along very well, but they
are likely to abuse the fowls, and as they can easily fly over any
ordinary fence, they cannot be controlled except by putting them in
covered yards. Turkeys kept under such conditions cause so much trouble
that, after the novelty of watching them has worn off, the owner soon
disposes of them. It is where the farms are large and there is a great
deal of woodland and pasture through which the turkeys may roam without
strict regard to farm boundaries, and large grain and grass fields where
they can forage after the crops are removed, that turkeys in large
numbers are grown for market with good profit. On such farms, too, the
farmer, if he is a good breeder, can produce the finest exhibition
specimens.
=Size of flocks.= The number of turkeys kept on a farm for breeding
usually depends upon the number of young it is desired to rear, but the
difficulty of keeping more than one adult male with the flock tends to
restrict the annual production to what can be reared from one male.
Experience has taught that it is not advisable to have more than ten or
twelve females with one male. Sometimes a much larger number is kept
with one gobbler, and the eggs hatch well and produce thrifty poults;
oftener an excess of females is responsible for poor results which the
breeder attributes to other causes. The average hen turkey lays only
eighteen or twenty eggs in the spring. Some hens lay even less. Once in
a long time a turkey hen lays continuously for many months. A turkey
grower who raises eight or ten turkeys for each hen in his breeding
flock does very well. To do much better than this the hatches must be
exceptionally good and the losses very light. Those who grow turkeys for
profit expect them to pick the most of their living from the time they
are a few weeks old until they are ready to fatten for market. A grower
will, therefore, rarely undertake to hatch more young turkeys than he
thinks can find food on the available range. It takes a very large farm
to provide food for a hundred young turkeys and the old birds which
produced them, after the young ones are well started. On many large
farms where turkeys are grown regularly, not more than seventy or eighty
are ever hatched, and if losses are heavy, not more than two or three
dozen may be reared. A farmer who grows from seventy to a hundred
turkeys is in the business on a relatively large scale. Flocks of larger
size are sometimes seen in the fall, but not very often. The ordinary
farm flock of breeding turkeys rarely has less than three or four or
more than ten or twelve hens.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account