Raising Turkeys as a Meat Source – My Final Thoughts Before the Last Harvest

Oh turkeys! One of my least favorite animals to keep on our homestead, but one of the only meat sources I personally will consume.

A conundrum of sorts. Not a fan of raising them, but a fan of adding them to our homestead meat supply. Today I’ll be discussing raising turkeys as a meat source and my final thoughts before we harvest the last tom and jenny standing.

We chose four Standard Bronze Turkeys which I originally had blogged a tad about here. I did enjoy them as poults, but not so much as adults. Unfortunately one of our turkey poults had something wrong with it and had to be put down so we raised three turkeys the last few months. 

We first processed Tom, at 3 months you can keep them longer, we just chose to process at 3 months for a variety of reasons. Yielding 8 or 9 pounds of ground meat, hanging weight of 18 pounds I would say that’s a pretty good yield since we aren’t a high meat consuming family. For us it works.

Jenny and Richard will be processed this coming weekend providing us about 27 “ish” pounds of ground turkey altogether.

Now let’s get into first my pros and cons, then I’ll detail how we humanely put down our turkey birds as well as how we process their meat.

Let’s begin with some cons from my perspective

• Messy, although their poop will be good for the gardening efforts these robust poopers are sure to leave a mess where you keep them.
• Heavy feeders, although we went with a more natural approach and chose the non-genetically modified turkey breed to raise, they feed heavily.
• Loud, they are loud, nothing like a screaming goat, but definitely not a quiet bird either.
• Fighting with our chickens and roosters. The males began fighting with our rooster causing all sorts of bird drama, we ended up removing them and placing them in another pen entirely. Marty (the rooster) was not a fan, poor little guy was doing his best to hold his own, but not a match for the size of the male turkeys.
• Annoying – I know that might seem ridiculous but they are a bit annoying, pooping only at the gates making for a squishy gag worthy step into their pen. When we let them free roam they seemed to only come back to the house to poop on our concrete. Again, my overly OCD ways just could not with this I like a clean operating homestead, turkey diarrhea on the patio won’t suffice.

My pros to raising turkeys on our homestead

• A tasty meat source for a homestead.
• Funny personalities, and friendly with my kids, and dogs.
• Easy to process, similar to a chicken yielding more meat.
• Pretty to look at, and smart. My kids have trained them to come when clapped at. It’s pretty hilarious to see them walking over to the kids as the kids clap across their pen. 
• Minimal shelter needs, I can’t help but worry about the animals staying warm in our frigid conditions, but these silly turkeys choose to nest in snow over their house. I seriously think they have the lowest shelter needs of all the animals we’ve raised. 
• Quick turnaround time for meat for your families needs. This is a bonus for us, because like I said not my favorite to raise, but they aren’t around for long.
• Respected our fencing, never flew over a five foot fence.

A random interesting fact about the turkey, is that they are like a living mood ring! Their faces change colors that was something new to me and funny to add around here! I noticed their faces were drained of color when fighting at the fence with the chickens, like ghostly white. Blue when they were happy? I have no idea what caused them to turn blue but comical nonetheless.

How we process our turkeys (and all our meat birds)

WARNING: If you are squeamish around blood, animal death, maybe just breeze through this section. You cannot achieve meat for consumption without death. Not my favorite part of homesteading at all, but a necessary part because my family does in fact eat meat in moderation.

A little bit about us and why we put our birds down this way has to do with my husbands job. My husbands career in the death field makes him an expert in my eyes (he’s pretty cool) on all things death. A knowledgeable man when it comes to the body and it’s functions. 

With that tidbit of information, our method is to chop the heads off immediately, this is the most humane method. When an animals throat is slit, it suffocates and chokes on it’s own blood before dying a slow death. Shooting a turkey is difficult for a head shot, resulting in an animal with bullet holes throughout it’s carcass.

Our goal is to minimize as much stress as possible for the animals we raise for meat. We owe it to them to be treated with respect, unto death. 

Hence, the chop.

I’ve heard many arguments to why people put down their animals in different ways, but for us we go for the chop, and no other method for the birds. To each their own I’m not condemning for a different way of putting down meat birds, just a bit of a back story for how and why we do it.

Our animals are all handled daily by us, so for us to grab a turkey is no big thing, they are used to us, so there isn’t stress when one is grabbed for processing. A prayer is said to the Lord and his provisions, and then the turkey is wrapped in a towel, laid on a chopping block and it’s head is swiftly removed in one hit.

My children prefer not to be a part of the “murdering” and really I don’t either, but my husband and I are a team providing food for our family, so I will hold the bird while he extends the neck and swiftly chops. My children do their part too and help to befriend all the animals around here which makes for murder day going much more smoothly. An animal that trusts you is much easier to catch than an animal who is indifferent or fearful around you. 

Now when Tom was processed I wasn’t expecting such force, an animal will always move after death this is natural, what I wasn’t expecting was how much. Tom started flapping, hit me in the face, and scratched up my hands and I looked like a lunatic chasing after a headless bird. Lesson learned, wrap tighter next time and make sure my gloves are securely on.

After removing the head, we let the blood drain from the turkey.

Next we boil an enormously large pot, or cauldron as I like to call it, once boiling we dip the turkey in for maybe 30 seconds, and swiftly remove the feathers. This is so simple, the feathers just come right out. We bought our LoCo Cooker from Lowe’s and it’s a huge benefit to our meat processing and skull processing efforts.

Once the turkey is plucked, we remove the skin, and set that aside for the dogs. I know this sounds barbaric (they are dogs.) We opt for minimal waste, and turkey skin is a delightful healthy organic treat for them.

Our homestead operates much more smoothly when we work as a team, even in the less than desirable jobs like gutting a turkey.

We don’t really ever eat a whole turkey, not even for Thanksgiving so we chose to put the meat through a meat grinder, making this process all the more simple. 

I love my meat grinder purchased from Walmart a few years ago, it’s been such a great investment for us. 

It took maybe 10 minutes to remove all the meat and run it through the meat grinder.

Then onto packaging. We use butcher paper and plastic wrap for all the meat we process. This prevents any spillage in the freezer, and looks nicer. I want to go into our freezer and grab a package of meat that looks pleasing to the eye. It’s just my OCD and perfectionist ways you could realistically throw meat into a plastic bag, to each their own.  

My youngest likes to help with this portion, I realized after the fact that she had mistaken 10.6 ounces for 1.06 pounds. Either way it’s enough for our family of four for a meal, and it’s an excellent way for her to learn to measure.

There is something so rewarding when opening up your freezer and seeing the fruits of all your labor. It gives you an appreciation for the hard work required to raise your own food. Call me crazy but to package the meat nicely makes me feel as if I’m honoring the animal even unto freezing.

Okay, now we’ve gotten murder out of the way, my overall assessment of raising turkeys on our homestead is that it’s worth it, for us. The next batch of turkey poults we raise will not be in our with our chickens in order to prevent Marty from getting upset and possessive of his hens.

An excellent meat source for increasing your meat self-sufficiency I’d encourage you to give them a try and find out for yourself what you think.

The funny thing about homesteading is everyone has their opinions, what you should or shouldn’t do, but I think it’s important for each homesteader to find out for themselves what works for them. Do your research and then dive in. I believe we learn best by mistakes, and hiccups.

Having raised three turkeys successfully we learned through some hiccups and our next batch of turkey raising hopefully will go a bit more smoothly.

Did you know that the turkey is like a living, breathing mood ring? Anyone else remember the beloved mood rings from the 90’s?

Happy Homesteading!

Danielle