Free Range Broad Breasted & Hertiage Narragansett Turkeys!

free-range

adjective

adjective: free-range

1. (of livestock, especially poultry) kept in natural conditions, with freedom of movement.

   • (of eggs) produced by birds reared under natural conditions.

There's just something totally awesome about raising your own meat for Thanksgiving. This year, Osh and I decided to test the waters and raise a small brood of turkeys. We decided on 2, one for Thanksgiving and one for Christmas dinner. But, when I got to Farm & Fleet, 3 seemed to be the magic number. 

Raising our own turkeys turned out to be quite the magical experience. To be honest, they are much better foragers than our chickens are. Turkeys are highly entertaining and did great with the other birds. However, there was a slight issue with the Tom stepping on baby ducklings but it wasn't for malicious reasons. He was extremely clumsy, and usually this occurred during feeding time.

The Bronze's have since gone to freezer camp -- a total of 68 pounds of meat in just 4 months! Success!

A few weeks ago, we took them to a meat processor out of Bristol WI. He charges $10 a bird, the birds were professionally processed and wrapped. The whole bringing them to get processed part wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. From the beginning, I had the mindset that they were meat but I did get slightly attached to the Tom. The turkeys were incredibly spoiled and lived an amazing, happy, free range life... I'm excited for that element.

Turkey raising went so amazingly, that we decided to add a heritage breed to our flock. The bronze are still great birds, but because of their large size, they are unable to procreate without being artificially inseminated. Which is why raising a dual purpose heritage breed for many reasons. The main one being to be able to preserve a bird that is currently listed as 'threatened' on the Livestock Conservancy List.

Next year, we hope to be able to raise a few more bronze's for thanksgivings. If anyone is interested in a bird, here is the breakdown of pricing:

$10 Poults
$10 Processing
$5 per bird (gas & driving)
+ $3.50 per lb.
Birds typically end up weighing somewhere around 12-30+ lbs.

Example:
12 pound bird would be $67.  $25 + 3(42) = $67

So basically a $25 deposit that goes towards all of the above.. Please let me know by March  or sooner if you're interested! P.S.
Big thank you to Molly for inspiring me to blog about our life. I'm having a blast so far!

Happy Tuesday!!!!!!!