Rachelcb80

A couple weeks ago my neighbor called early in the morning. He was clipping a pasture and had partially run over a turkey nest. :( The hen flew off at the last minute and that's the only reason he stopped the tractor and saw the nest. Thankfully many of the eggs were still intact. Knowing the hen would not come back to her destroyed nest, he asked me if I wanted to try and incubate them. Of course I took on the task and have had the eggs in the incubator for two weeks now.

I had no idea how long the hen had been setting the eggs so I didn't know how long they had to go before hatching. I candled them but turkey eggs are more difficult than chicken eggs to see through and I couldn't get any real idea as to how far along they were. This morning in a half sleep state I heard loud peeping. I instantly sat up and ran into the laundry room. There in the incubator were two chicks flopping around and carrying on. I don't think I really expected any to hatch so I was very excited.

As of right now I have four that have hatched and three more in the process of pecking out of their shells. My fingers are crossed for as many to make it as possible. I'm hoping to raise them up and turn them loose outside once they've matured. What they do from there will be interesting. (I've read they're likely to hang around where they were hatched and raised. I don't really want a group of wild turkeys as my yard pets. :shock: But I think they're likely to wander off with the other wild turkeys around us here.)