I have read that if you raise chickens you should not also have turkeys due to a disease called blackhead. Supposedly chickens are carriers of the disease and turkeys suffer from it. I have heard people in other forums talk about raising both. Has anyone here done it? Have you had any problems with blackhead? The warnings I have read are holding me back from trying turkeys since I have chickens and let them free-range. We would love to raise our own, rather than pay someone else to raise one in a less than humane way for us.
My chickens and turkeys have been living together and have been raised together for years. I've not had any blackhead disease in my flock. I even have my ducks and geese in the same area as the turkeys and chickens.
I've never had a problem either. I was watchful at first as I've read a lot of what your have, but I haven't had a problem
I had actually never heard of this disease before. We have always had a turkey or 2 around the chickens with no problems. However, our turkeys were always free ranging, and most of the chickens are penned.
I haven't looked for any sources online, I read about it in all of my chicken "how to " books. They warned against raising chickens and turkeys together. One book, which I really like, is written by someone who raises chickens, turkeys and I think also ducks all together. They free range together and sleep in the same coop at night. The book is called "The Chicken Tractor." I think I'll ask around some more about this because I really would like to add turkeys to my flock.
I did read a short thing online on it yesterday, after I googled it. I didn't read further because we don't have turkeys right now, sold them. If you are really concerned, talk to someone at one of the local feed stores. Those guys have been around so long that they will have heard if anyone has had a big problem with the blackhead disease in your area. But if you want to get just a pair of turkeys and try it for a while, I wouldn't invest a bunch of money on the turkeys just in case. In our case, we invested zip as someone gave us the turkeys. I like turkey eggs for cooking, you can use one turkey egg in place of 2-3 regular eggs.
Yea we have chickens and wild turkeys and pigmy goats all free ranging on 20 ackrs with no fence. Going on 2nd yr and have not hear or seen any problems. One thing is dogs came through property and cleaned out most of my chickens. I'm left with 5 rosters and 2 hens. The darn rosters start crowing sometimes at 2am out in the coop. All five of them...UUUghhh.
Blackhead is caused by protozoans that are inside cecal worms that are then excreted in the feces... the parasites can't live more than a few hours outside a host BUT if the parasite is inside the eggs of the cecal worms they can stay viable for up to FOUR YEARS... a good rule of thumb (not to be too vulgar): don't let them "**** where they eat" & it will probably be ok
