Maybe Urgent: Turkey trouble - Poult gets part of beak pecked(?) off...

The joy of our little farm that's forming is we work in the city during the day and are gone a fair amount of time, so things have to be hardy enough to stand eachother -- until now, it had not been a problem.

Moose bought 2 Turkey poults and 4 Chanties at the Watrous sale and they've been in the brooder together without issue -- until now. We came home to discover (what we think is a hen) one of the chicks had not only been pecked, but had part of her beak pecked/eaten off by the other turkey poult (which we think is a tom). Being that all 6 birds are white and only 2 were bloody, I suspect it was the so-thought tom that decided the feed wasn't good enough, and why not try some turkey face.

I've linked a video below. I'm worried about her. We've separated her and kept her in with the heat light at the same time. The other turkey is jumping at the wire covering the brooder, still trying to get up at her. He also pulled out a couple over her feathers on her one wing. I'm not sure (I assume they do) if they have blood feathers, but if they do I would suspect, what with the blood, that he did get blood feathers as it's bloody and scabbed there. I'm concerned about her breathing, which is why the video.

Is there something I can do? You can see the damage to her beak in the video as well. I'd like to try to save her as my opinion with brooder raised birds is different from broody hen raised birds, and I feel like it's my obligation to help her as much as I can without going overboard and keeping her suffering.

Thanks for any/all help. I suppose step one is to see how she is in the morning.

Video: https://youtu.be/YafDy5KBuEA

sorry to hear about this, I am unable to see the video as it is marked private.
Not sure what the problem could be....

mirycreek wrote:sorry to hear about this, I am unable to see the video as it is marked private.
Not sure what the problem could be....

I suck at youtube.

Try this: https://youtu.be/YafDy5KBuEA I changed the setting.

that worked for me now but hard to tell, I think rapid shallow breathing would just be a reaction to stress/pain.
Hope it can heal up alright, I do not know anything about turkeys unfortunately.

I have a tom that lost half his top beak when he was a poult and it never grew back. I had to separate him until he could defend himself and I had to give him a deep dish of food so he could dip his face into it to get food. He is now 3 years old and doing very well, he still eats from deeper dishes (usually he eats out of my feed bucket before i fill dishes).

Sweetened, My turkey poults are picking at the base of the beak as well. It's awful. I can't watch your video, because I have dial up. But is it the base of the beak that is being picked?

I was thinking that maybe a person could file or clip the tip of the beak from the ones that are doing the picking so that their beak isn't quite so sharp. I'm scared of over clipping though in case I hit the quick... I've never trimmed beaks before.

Perhaps someone with experience with this will instruct?

silkiebantam wrote:Sweetened, My turkey poults are picking at the base of the beak as well. It's awful. I can't watch your video, because I have dial up. But is it the base of the beak that is being picked?

Hi Silkie. I must selfishly admit I'm somewhat comforted that I'm not the only one dealing with this and that it isn't just inexperience on my/our part that let this happen. The part that is being pecked is right where the nose turns into the beak on the top. I haven't really fought the issue with her to try to open her beak to see if it's all the way through because it's scabbed up a bit. I can take a picture when I get home. I can't see her tongue or anything through the top, but there's no longer a smooth lead from her beak to her nose. The top beak isn't hanging or anything, but there is definitely a good portion missing. I guess I'm lucky its the top part because they can still scoop if it dies off?

That other turkey is still jumping at the top of the brooder, trying to get out to keep eating her. He's such a menace -- I'm not sure how fond I am of Turkeys or if this is a common thing.

@ Prairie Chick -- Thanks, that's very comforting.

@Miry, I think that's a great point about pain. When I checked on her this morning before work, her breathing was a little more regulated, though you can hear her breathing now. It makes a whistling noise, I think because of the damage to the area, and she's breathing with her mouth slightly open. She had eaten and had some water during the night though, which is good.