Those baby turkeys that hatched in early April spent several weeks in a brooder. When they were old enough, I then put them in the "Green Tamale" which is a chicken tractor I built a couple of years ago. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the term, Chicken Tractor, the structure is simply a floorless enclosure. Unlike what the name might imply, chickens don't drive them, and a tractor isn't necessary to move some of them. Further, any feathered creature can be housed in one. There are many forms of chicken tractors; as many as the imagination will allow. Some have wheels, others with skids, some are made out of plastic pipe. They are cool because they allow the birds to eat grass, weeds, and bugs while tilling up the soil. Manure acts as plant nutrients as they are efficiently scratched into the ground. The Green Tamale has removable wheels, is heavy, and actually takes my tractor to move. It has built in roosts too.

We built a makeshift yard off the side of the tractor but soon the turkeys were climbing over and under the fence and it was challenging to catch them. Sometimes with their collective bulky weight, they's simply push through the plastic fence. You have not experienced cardio fun until you have tried to catch a runaway turkey.

The solution was a Turkey Tractor. Austin and I built another tractor which is 16' x 16' x 3'. It's fairly lightweight and moveable with two people. Our new model features a side and top entry door and a shaded portion. Soon it will have a 5 gallon automatic watering bowl.

This evening I purchased a small electric fence unit which will protect them from digging predators. Raccoons, badgers, and coyotes are known to dig under the sides to gain access. The top and sides are protected with chicken wire and heavy gauge netting.

Note that their flight wings have been clipped (3 times). Even so, they are good flyers and can leap tall obstructions in a single bound. When caught, they exhale with a sort of hissing sound and they remind me of prehistoric pterodactyls or rural vultures. As a sidenote, turkeys are actually in the vulture family.