What Breed?

[Misfit Farm]

This is my new girl. She is my first Turkey - I found her on Craigslist, she was rescued from being Thanksgiving dinner. Anyway, I believe she is a Bronze but can you tell if she is a Broad Breasted or a Standard? She seems huge to me and she is quite heavy. I do not know how old she is. She is super friendly and loves people.

Jen

 

[Frosty]

The size of the legs and feet makes me think Broad Breasted... feel underneath her in the breast area. If it feels wide, she is a BB. If she feels like she has the frame of a very large chicken, she is standard. If she is a BB, she is still pretty young, maybe 4 or 5 months? She is a pretty girl!

 

[Misfit Farm]

She is huge - I can not feel her breast bone and she is very wide. Also, I just heard back from the person I got her from. She says she is about 6 months old. Sounds like she is a BB which makes me sad as I have heard how short their lives are. At what point does a BB reach full size or do they just keep growing until their size kills them?

Jen

 

[ColbyNTX]

She is a BBB. You just prolonged her life for a while.

 

[kfacres]

I have a pair of BBW birds, and my parents a trio... that we plan to keep and try to get fertile eggs from in the springtime. I have a feeling, that in order to actually get fertile eggs from the BBW hens, we'll have to let the heritage Bronze cover them.

 

[HallFamilyFarm]

1) there is only one breed of turkey: Turkey. There are several varieties, but only one "breed".

2) She is a Broad Breasted Bronze. At best she may live a year or so. Unless she is on a slimfast type diet, she will continue to grow larger and you will ahve similair issues as you would a cornishX broiler.

3) a Standard Bronze would mate with a BB, but it is more difficult. Fertility will be lower.

You really are better off eating the Broad Breasted turkeys and buying Heritage turkey poults for breeding. Your egg production will be better and fertility, thus hatchability higher in the heritage varieties. A good thread to read concerning meat birds is Life Span in Cornish White Cross

 

[Taylor]

A Bronze Hen, maybe a Broad Breasted due to her size, but for sure a Bronze