BB Turkey time to finish

[cjf09]

Hello all,
My daughter's are wanting to do a turkey project next year for 4H. I've read conflicting information on how long it takes to finish these birds - 16 weeks to 24 weeks seems to be the range. I'm trying to figure if we would have enough time to raise them to market size.
Thanks!

 

[crealbilly]

I would say closer to 24 to 28 weeks. When I had BB I would process them when they could not walk very well anymore. I had a 26 and 28 lb dressed bird almost to big for the oven but we canned the leftovers after we had our fill of sandwiches and made broth with the feet and the rest. Theres juat something about using all the bird when you raise and process yourself - you just don't want to waste any. And you have a great respect for the bird and the food it has given you. At least for me this is absent when I buy them frozen from the store.


I fed mine meatbird feed 21% protein and 1 tbls of Bragg's ACV / gallon of water from day one to process and they were some of the best turkeys we ever eat.

I've since went with burbon red heritage turkeys because I want to try and breed them.

 

[cjf09]

Ok thanks, think we would only have 20 weeks roughly unless I can find a hatchery selling earlier. They might have to do a laying hen or broiler project instead.

 

[cjf09]

As I'm in NE BC, is there any hatchery besides Rochester/Miller that would have poults in February or March? Those are the only two I have found that I think would be close enough

 

[cjf09]

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[cjf09]

Internet glitched on me :/ sorry for the duplicates...