Bodger
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Light Sussex.Here's a Light Sussex cockerel that I killed this morning. Its one of the birds that I hatched from the eggs that I had from the Fred Hams utility strain earlier in the year. Its the only cockerel from the hatch that had yellow legs, so he was the first one to go.
He plucked out quite nicely.
He's dressed out at over 7lb and he should be a useful addition to our table. Well worth the effort. :nwink:
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Bodger
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What's up? Nobody on Downsizer producing their own poultry these days?
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Woo
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That could have been a scene from my place at the weekend.
we finished ours in a pie last night.
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Bodger
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I'm hoping that ours stretches that far too.
I've got around ten more of them to work my way through over the next few months. Mostly Light Sussex but with a couple of Welsummers thrown in too.
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Piggyphile
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It has been turkey season for me, oven ready in the freezer. I haven't had any male chickens (see how careful I was with my wording) recently as the last hatch was all female (3) but the current lot looks like 3 males 1 female but only a few weeks old so nothing until next year.
I might put a pic of the turkey up when we cook her, she dressed out at 12kg and I wouldn't have wanted her any bigger as she wouldn't have fit in the oven. The male was jointed as he was huge
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Bodger
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We've done turkeys a few times over the years but the last lot that we did, were a total failure It was a couple of years ago and we reared them until about ten weeks of age, only for them to go down with Blackhead. I went to the local vets to get medication, only to find that all the stuff you used to be able to get had been taken off the approved list. I'd like to rear turkeys again but I found it all very disheartening, I lost every last one of them.
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Piggyphile
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The previous year we had four turkeys and all went wonderfully, 3 males 1 female a bit of shoving about but fine. This year 2 males one female bronze and they fought. One male died of a heart attack I think, he was still warm when I found him so I jointed him but threw away the carcass. Then a few days later the other male died from infected wounds on his snood from the fight so I discarded all of him. Only a small cut which was not noticeable until it was too late, he died within 12 hours. So I had to despatch the female early rather than leaving her on her own.
I am hoping to try again next year and keep a breeding pair of the local smaller Spanish black turkeys rather than a double breasted commercial breed. We keep them in the orchard well away from the chickens so hoping that blackhead is not a problem. I really like keeping them, they are real characters and they love windfalls.
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Barefoot Andrew
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Every time I see this thread's title I read a call to arms to lift the South Coast out of the darkness
A.
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