Chicken litter on food plots

Do any of you have any experience with using chicken litter on your plots? The reason I posted this topic in the turkey forum is because some studies indicate that the chicken litter can have a negative effect on turkeys. If you have had success or good experiences, what rate did you apply per acre? If you have had some bad experiences, I would like to hear about those also.

Thanks. JR

DON'T DO IT. Unless you want to kill all your turkeys by disease.

We have used it on our place for the last 4 years. Hasn't hurt our population at all.

The litter has been cured/heat treated, and is not straight out of houses.

God Bless,
David B.

The litter they spread around the house, is absolutely straight out of the house. And we absolutely do not have turkeys anymore

Take this for what you want.. I don't believe for one minute that chicken litter can or will possibly hark turkeys from disease or so forth. We have used it for years, any way shape form and fashion, and have always had a strong turkey population.. 30 miles north around my dads house you couldn't buy a turkey. They are either there or not, but not because of chicken litter.... My $.02

Alabama has a lot more turkeys now than in the early 60's
and Alabama has a heck of a lot more chickens than in the early 60's.
Chicken litter does not wipe out wild turkeys.

Let's see - so you take the areas of the state with the highest amount of chicken houses ( Cullman and Morgan counties), and think there is absolutely no connection to why these areas have very little population, so much so that seasons have either been closed or limited in the past, and just go with your gut feeling about it, or use one small area with a few poultry farms to decide - there's absolute zero connection.

May want to be a little more open minded that just maybe, just maybe, some poultry farm practice at some point could have affected things.

I know they used to be turkeys at my house an on futher up the valley in the early 80's. When they started spreading chicken litter the turkeys disappeared. I don't know if they left or died but there ain't none here now I know that!

I've read that litter that has been heat treated, i think they call it brood litter, won't hurt turkeys.

Don't do it. Southern Tennessee and parts of north alabama are seeing the results of litter. TWRA and a group of biologist out of Georgia are listing litter as one it the top culprits for the decline in turkey population. Do a little digging into poultry science and you will see an avian disease called black head. I know of several birds killed and found dead that had the symptoms. Two years ago seemed to be the mass kill off. I had a buddy that had birds walking around without meat on their legs nothing but bone showing. They develop sores on their legs and head and basically turn to jelly and fall dead. It serious up this way. Yekrut can back up my post. Before they started spreading litter we could stand on a ridge in southern tn and hear 10 to 20 birds a morning. Now you are lucky to hear a bird other than a crow.

yep the turkeys can get blackhead from the chicken litter IF the chickens it came from carried blackhead, its definately a gamble and i wouldnt feel comfortable doing it. i would just spread horse or cow manure or fertilizer.

Truth

There is far more evidence that untreated chicken litter kills turkeys than there is of man-made global warming. We need to get Al Gore on this. If Obama would have made me the Turkey Czar, as I requested, spreading untreated chicken litter would now carry the death penalty.

If you look at the chicken litter they are spreading its not just droppings it has dead chickens in it to that has died from diease. I dont live to far from Rockhound and what he speaks is true for this area. The benefit from using it is not worth the chance.

I used the treated peletized chicken chit this fall and had good results. I will never use untreated where I want turkeys to thrive.

Blackhead does not cause sores on the legs and head.

What evidence is there? The main evidence I see is that there are dead turkeys and there are chickens around....problem is there are chickens around in much of Alabama.

I hear about these dead turkeys but rarely see where anyone has even gone to the trouble of actually getting a diagnosis of what happened.

I would guess you are a chicken farmer?

Sit tight on your question because TWRA is in a deep dive with a group of biologist from Georgia on the problem right now. Tennessee has been one of the most pro active game and fish department I have ever seen. They are really serious about their turkeys and if evidence is to be found they will find it and fix the problem.

Like the above Not knowing does or does not I would not want to error on using it.

I live on the Cullman/Morgan county line and what few birds we have I am confident have multiplied over the last 10 years. I dont know the effects of litter to Turkey but as much as is spread here I wouldnt think there would be a bird population left if it was bad. The birds here are so few and far between I would think one bad batch of litter in the right area could wipe them out. I know of two dairy farms that have the highest population of birds that I know of but I cant swear they spread litter. I only know three facts about chicken litter which are not related to your question. It makes grass grow, you will have weeds come up that you didnt know you had and it will flat out make a heifer grow faster and slick off pretty as ever more than anything else I know of .

I've noticed a decline in areas where it's been used. Was it because of chicken litter, maybe, maybe not? I'd be interested to see the half life of some of the diseases found in chicken litter, if any.

Not a farmer myself but I work with them plenty.

That's fine if they find the litter is a problem, I just haven't seen any evidence yet. I agree that if turkeys are dying, we should look into why and the first step is to get a diagnosis which I haven't seen yet.

As someone else said, litter has been spread for a long time and the turkey population grew during that time.

I'll back up your post, I live in Lawrence county TN and we are void of turkeys

It's sad. I have hunted turkey all over this country and there is not a prettier place on earth to be standing at daylight than the hills of southern Tennessee. It use to be the meca for turkey hunters. I hope I will see it rebound to half of what it use to be.

I know it's cheap and will grow the hell out of grass but, I would not chance it will my turkeys. If I want to have any. Jmo

I agree with yall. I hunt Alot in Giles, Lawrence, Wayne, and Lincoln in TN and since 2006 spring numbers have been declining. Don't know if its chickne letter or what. Something is wron gthough.

As coffee says, that is not Blackhead.

Here's a list of avian killers:

http://www.albc-usa.org/documents/turkeymanual/ALBCturkey-5.pdf

I'll back up both post, wildlife biologist are/were having meetings with locals in Giles,lawerence, and Wayne counties to discuss what was causing the mass die off. Strong evidence showed it was due to spreading the untreated chicken litter and causing disease in turkey. I've hunted in Wayne county for 6 years and I've seen a big difference in just those 6 years. An inlaw who has hunted up there his hole life says you dont see 1/3 of the turkey there use to be. He is one that believes the die off is because of the chicken litter.

What specific disease are they linking between chicken litter and wild turkey mortality

http://www.nwtf.org/conservation/bulletins/bulletin_25.pdf
There's lots of info as to not mixing chickens and turkeys, I'm sure we'll see more of this in the future. The symptoms the gentlemen discribed earlier doesnt sound like normal sign of blackhead I agree. The areas that practice chicken litter for fertilzer in my area the turkey populations are suffering.I don't know if thats what caused it but I wish more research could be done to verify. My birds I'm raising at home had a bad round of fowl poxs in the dry form which is not normally lethal unless in turns into the wet form which I treated them with antibiotics and kept their wounds clean and managed without a loss of any birds.

Guys. I am not trying to say that the birds with the bone showing were a result of blackhead. I am not a poultry science major but an straight up turkey killing machine that I know is and works for Aviagan. He personally found several birds dead that he claims were a result of blackhead based on his observation. The birds with the bare boned legs were a little north west of Pulaski and more than a couple of those birds were killed that year. I dont give a rats rump if its blackhead, pox, flu. Makes no difference to me all I care about is getting it fixed. This problem bleeds down into Limeston and Lauderdale Co Alabama and I am hearing a few in North western Madison make the same claims.

https://www.mdwfp.com/wildlife-hunting/t...ey-numbers.aspx

Thanks guys for all of the feedback. I really appreciate the comments, insight, & personal experiences. The land owner will ultimately have to decide what route he wants to take.

JR

Again DON'T DO IT