Shopsmith Forums

Hey there. I have wild turkeys living in our suburban neighborhood. It's not unusual to see in excess of 20 together marching through my yard. The real problem is my bird feeder, although they do a number on gardens too. I like feeding and watching the cardinals, finch, chickadees, jays, woodpeckers and even robins. But every day the turkeys get all the feed out of the feeder. They're worse than squirrels. No firearm suggestions please, I don't want to PO any of my neighbors. I tried to post a pic but the file was too large? Thanks for reading.

Just post this in your front yard. Should take care of your problem.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_f ... media/File:

I have a similar situation but the bird feeder I have is safe from any turkey ravaging. All they get is what the other birds drop on the ground. Maybe get a new and better bird feeder.

I have no practical experience with wild turkeys, but you might want to start with some of the deterrent type of products. I have used bird spikes and other products with some success on other nuisance birds around my property. The link below might be a starting point for you with regard to wild turkeys. Of course, if I did have a problem with wild turkeys near my property they would have a hard time escaping the gravity from my BBQ smoker.

https://www.humanesociety.org/resources ... ld-turkeys

sehast wrote:I have a similar situation but the bird feeder I have is safe from any turkey ravaging. All they get is what the other birds drop on the ground. Maybe get a new and better bird feeder.

What kind of feeder do you have?

RFGuy wrote:I have no practical experience with wild turkeys, but you might want to start with some of the deterrent type of products. I have used bird spikes and other products with some success on other nuisance birds around my property. The link below might be a starting point for you with regard to wild turkeys. Of course, if I did have a problem with wild turkeys near my property they would have a hard time escaping the gravity from my BBQ smoker.

https://www.humanesociety.org/resources ... ld-turkeys

Thanks!. A couple of good tips there, that scarecrow sprinkler would work in my budget and yard. And I've read they don't like water so....

What's the law concerning fire crackers this time of year where you live?

berry wrote:

sehast wrote:I have a similar situation but the bird feeder I have is safe from any turkey ravaging. All they get is what the other birds drop on the ground. Maybe get a new and better bird feeder.

What kind of feeder do you have?

Here is what I have but there are many less expensive types available that will keep the seed safe from turkeys. This one defeats squirrels as well and is built like a tank.

http://www.rollerfeeder.com/live/produc ... rd-feeder/

I have a few of those critters myself!
But they can’t reach our birdfeeder, and we don’t have a vegetable garden, so we haven’t seen any downside to them.

I highly recommend the “Squirrel Buster” feeders. The perch ring is spring-loaded, so that when heavier criters like squirrels, crows, and such get on it, the perch drops and closes shutters over the feeding ports. Works like a charm, and the spring preload is even adjustable if you want to fine-tune the max bird weight.

The only time I had a problem was when raccoons managed to unhook it and drop it to the ground. That cracked the feed tube. I contacted the manufacturer, and they sent me a new tube free of charge.

We had a problem with starlings cleaning out the feeder so we found a dog crate that anything from cardinals on down could jump through easily but the fatter starlings could not do it easily. We put the main feeder in the crate, sitting on a table. We have been using it for maybe 5 years now and it has saved us enough bird seed cost to allow us to set up several kinds of other feeding stations. We feed the doves on a table and they pick up the thin layer of seed but the starlings only want easy to eat deep seed. We keep suet blocks in double walled containers that the starlings do raid a bit but nothing like they did the single wall containers. Nobody but the finches eat at the thistle seed bags. We watch all of the birds pretty closely so we can feel that about everybody gets something. I can really recommend the dog crate...

On a side note... Diana and I became great great grandparents last week. Makes me feel kind of old...


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