Turkeys

[jaku]

I'm starting to think about my spring turkeys. I'm doing them for the first time. I'm putting 6 of the broad breasted whites in a 10x10x3' tractor. Do I need special turkey food, or will my 22% broiler feed work? Obviously, it would be a lot cheaper to feed them what I already buy in bulk.

 

[Brunty_Farms]

It will work fine, I use the same thing. I start them on the 22% and when they are about 10-12 weeks feed them a 16% which is a lot cheaper than the 22%

Good luck... Get them in July if you want 16-24 lb turkeys. If you order them too early they will be huge.

 

[jaku]

Quote:
Great to know! I'm going to get them early so that I can have some huge birds. I'm going to butcher a couple at regular size for roasting on Thanksgiving and Christmas, then the others I'm going to let get huge, skin them out and make a ton of jerky, sausage and breast meat.

 

[Southerngirl]

Ditto on the 22%; I actually use 20% and combined it with whole corn and those babies were FAT, JUICY and TENDER!! Especially a turkey breast marinated in Sweet baby Rays Raspberry Chipotle sauce and slowly baked. I am doubling my turkey order this year. Just from my experience alone, my BB whites dressed out alot heavier than my BB Bronzes.

 

[Brunty_Farms]

OMG... Sweet Baby Rays Raspberry Chipotle?

I can't get any of the Chipotle up North, they just don't sell it. I picked some up while I was in Florida and oh man was it awesome. I may have to pay to get some mailed up here!!



Jaku-

I was gonna say, be careful getting them that big because they don't fit in the oven! But if your going to part them out and do what your going to do... you should be fine. I might have to make a trip up to give you a hand... You would have to mail me a couple of strips of that jerky though!! Hahah.... and have a cold one ready. Ah who am I kidding... that time of year, I can't even take the time to eat dinner, let alone dive up to Michigan.

 

[zephyrcreek]

I'm here in MI too and fed mine the same broiler feed as my chickens. They did great. I purchased mine a little too early and restricted feed so that they would not get too big. The 20-25 lbs was perfect for my family and customers. We save the 28lb bronze for our family dinner, and had to shop around to find a roasting pan large enough. I cannot even imagine a 40lb turkey.

 

[Buster52]

Quote:
Great to know! I'm going to get them early so that I can have some huge birds. I'm going to butcher a couple at regular size for roasting on Thanksgiving and Christmas, then the others I'm going to let get huge, skin them out and make a ton of jerky, sausage and breast meat.

Hey, Jaku. welcome back. Been wondering where you were.

My experince with skinning was that it was much more difficult than plucking with turkeys. And much more difficult than skinning chickens. I've read others have had the same experience.

Just FYI.

 

[jaku]

Jeff- anytime... I'll have the turkeys and the beers ready! How about AMOUNT of feed? I usually guess about 500 lbs for each 25 broilers, but how much should I plan with turkeys? Granted, it's only six of them, but I'll have them a lot longer, and they're obviously a lot bigger. Any ideas on that?

Buster- thanks. I haven't been online much lately. My wife just had our second baby, and although I currently don't have any chickens, and I took a full month off work, it's been pretty busy around here! I'm probably not going to actually "skin" the turkeys, rather use my filleting method I normally do on chickens. Hopefully it will work similarly, as I certainly don't have a plucker or oven big enough to handle the monster birds!

 

[Brunty_Farms]

Well, I'm not very good at keeping records even though I should be. I went through about 12,000-14,000 lbs I'm looking back at my feed bills and they are mixed in with layer and broiler so it's hard to determine what's what... but by looking at dates this is what I have.

Mine were processed at 17 weeks and they ate say 13,000 lbs. I had 300 that were processed.... I suck at math but I would guess at about 50 lbs per turkey or something like that... maybe a bit more. I ended up with 16-24 lb birds. So that's something to go off of.

I lost a few, and at different ages and there were times I had to feed broiler feed to them, it was truly a mess. This year I will keep better records, but I always say that.

 

[BirchHatchery]

im thinkin of raising a few turketys up this year how many weeks does it take for a bronze brested or white turkey to get to size?