Just processed turkeys and discovered some of them had “unhealthy looking” livers, ok to eat?

[rjohns39]

Fair enough. My husband saw them, said they were greenish grey… I haven’t been able to find any reference to that kind of coloration on line - most sites talk about Dark red / purple, versus light / yellow livers.

Sounds like the gallbladder leaked or ruptured. I would think the meat is safe based upon the two articles I provided.

 

[Bo Garrett]

It also depends on how long your feed withdrawal was before slaughter, this will affect the color of the livers. Generally, about 8 hours withdrawal is suggested anything over that and you will see the liver become discolored. This type of discoloration will not affect the quality or safety of the carcass.

Bo

 

[Tennessee Great Granny]

We just processed our 4 month old flock or 14 turkeys and the folks processed them for us said that 3 of them had “bad livers” - sort of a greyish color. They all seemed very healthy - ranged in weight from 13-20lbs (the Toms got very big) and all were eating and drinking well and didn’t exhibit any signs of lethargy. The processing folks asked if we housed them with chickens, we did not, but at about 3 months of age, we expanded their indoor area to include a space that had held chickens about 6 weeks prior, but we had thoroughly cleaned and disinfected with vinegar solution prior to giving them access. They were fed exclusively organic feed, and spent most of their days out in their outside run, or in our orchard. They didn’t show any signs of illness, but perhaps were in the early stages of blackhead disease? One of the ones effected had a slight droop to her wings in the couple days before processing. My questions are: Has anyone had any experience with this and know what might be the cause? And is the meat still safe to eat? All our birds are spoken for and we have planned to keep 3 for our self… which means we have only these three that exhibited bad livers… can we eat the meat? If not, can we use it for dog food?
Any guidance is appreciated. Thanks.

It may have been very possible that your turkeys were developing blackhead disease, and just not to the desperately sick and dying stage yet. Droopy wings and diarrhea, liver turning grey from parasites eating their way into them are all signs of it. It's not a good idea to put turkeys anywhere they can be exposed to chickety doo doo, fresh, old, or otherwise. The chicken parasite that causes black head disease in turkeys can survive 3 years after they are expelled into the environment from a chicken's digestive tract. I have no clue if it is safe to eat their meat. I'd cook it well done in a pressure cooker and feed it to the dogs. Parasites should be killed by the cooking. The birds with the infested livers had their entire body becoming deathly ill since most of the birds with that disease die from it quickly. The entire place you raised your turkeys in can not be used for turkeys again. This is so sad because we all work so hard to set up our birds, and when something goes wrong , well you know first hand.

 

[jmurno]

When I butchered my BB whites a couple weeks ago, a couple of them had livers that were a little bit on the pale or grey side. So not that super bright dark red, but close to it. Earlier in the year 3 of them had a single black wart each on head/neck. I decided it was probably Avian Pox. 2 of them fought it off and the warts disappeared. One looked like it was healing up and in the process of beating the virus. I figured if they are healthy enough to fight off Avian pox, then I feel comfortable with a few of them having a slightly pale/greyish liver. So it was a judgement call for me.
I had one BB white earlier in the year that was sick and not getting better. I butchered it and found that it had something wrong with its lungs -- foamy orange-ish secreations. I made the judgement call on that one to just eat the legs and wings and have had no ill health effects from it.
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I have read a lot of comments on forums of people saying 'I would never eat a sick bird'. I have not seen any scientific or logical basis to support this caution. We are mammals. There are almost no illnesses that we can catch from birds other than the ones you hear about on the news sometimes such as the common flu or West Nile Virus. Humans cannot catch blackhead nor avian pox. For me, I would rather eat one of my organic fed pasture raised turkeys with a pale liver than factory farmed turkey fed glyphosate sprayed corn and given pharmaceuticals. And who is to say that the birds sold at the grocery stores had healthy looking livers anyway.