TURKEYS— THEIR CARE AND MANAGEMENT. 



49 



after is patent. If the parent stock is not strong, the young 

 will not be so. Mind, I do not say weight, but size. Turkeys 

 that are not large lramed birds may weigh very heavy, espe- 

 cially young stock, but after they are fully matured the little 

 boned birds will not weigh so well. 



Why do I say I consider size first? Simply because the 

 standard requires weight and cuts harder for lack of weight 

 than for anything else, and if we have to be governed by the 

 standard we must come to consider size in breeding stock. 

 If you were to ask my personal preference, I might give a 

 different reply. The fancier must consider size in order to 

 win in the show room, and then the turkeys are "cut all to 

 pieces" on weight which they lose in shipping. Again, the 

 fancier miist consider size because ten customers require 

 large turkeys where one requires fancy points. But the fan- 

 cier must combine the size and fancy points and this takes 

 study in mating. It is not the rule that the largest turkeys 

 in the flock score the highest, be they ever so well bred. 



1 will never believe that the demand for immense 

 weights required by the standard and turkey raisers is wise. 

 I have lost the heaviest turkeys I ever owned simply from 

 being over fat, and I do not feed very much for flesh, either. 

 It is not unusual for me to lose sales because I cannot quote 

 as heavy weights as are demanded, yet I have as large tur- 

 keys as any fancier. I know over-fat stock is not good for 

 breeding purposes, and so does every one who has given the 

 subject any careful attention, yet a turkey must weigh so 

 many pounds regardless of consequences. If the would-be 

 purchaser would be satisfied with standard weights then 

 there would be some reason in the demands, but I have often 

 received inquiries in November for young toms weighing 

 from thirty pounds up to sixty, "sixty preferred." Now 

 everybody with common sense knows, or should be taught, 

 that in this climate it is almost impossible to make a young 

 torn weigh thirty pounds in November, or even December, 

 and that to do so is an injury to breeding qualities. From 

 January to March young toms may weigh from twenty-eight 

 to thirty-two pounds without any special effort at fattening 

 them. I prefer a pullet from sixteen to eighteen pounds 

 rather than one heavier, and I know that I voice the senti- 

 ments of some of the best fanciers in the United States. The 

 over large hen does not lay so many eggs, nor are those she 

 does lay so fertile. 



It will not be many years before this demand for exces- 

 sive weights will be greatly, modified. Market poultrymen 

 say our Bronze turkeys are too large for their trade, and the 

 market pouitrymen must control the turkey trade. If we 

 continue to increase the size of the Bronze, some other breed 

 will take its place, and when this happens the Bronze turkey 

 fancier who has tried to excel all others by breeding the 

 heaviest weights will see this error. 



I hope I will not be considered as advocating small tur- 

 keys, for I am not, and I could call hundreds to testify that I 

 stand for large boned turkeys. The weights of mine as 

 adults have not been excelled in the west, but what I do 

 plead against is the demand for the pound of flesh, which is 

 far easier to put o"n the short legged, small boned turkey, 

 than on the .tall, majestic fellow, that will, as a yearling, 

 weigh from thirty-five to forty pounds. The extremely 

 heavy weights are fit only for the show room and the fan- 

 cier's yard, -while the medium sized bird is the better turkey 

 for all purposes. I do not like to breed from excessively 

 large turkeys, neither does any other fancier, and yet the 

 fancier has created the demand for these birds by advertis- 

 ing excessive weights to catch trade, and the farmer has 

 caught the spirit, and without really knowing what is best, 

 demands what he sees advertised. 



If I were a farmer raising market poultry I would want 



turkey pullets weighing from fifteen to seventeen pounds, 

 good large-boned birds, not fat, and young toms weighing 

 from twenty-four to twenty-eight pounds, or yearlings from 

 thirty to thirty-five. I would hatch my turkeys early and in 

 the fall they would be as good market turkeys as anybody 

 would want. I would keep the pure Bronze turkeys, for 

 nothing has ever equalled them. I would not do as some 

 have done — inbreed until I decreased both vigor and size of 

 my birds, nor would I save the late small, runty turkeys to 

 breed from. I would save nice pullets and yearling hens 

 and buy a torn from some fancier every year; or if I were 

 short of money I might keep one two years, though I prefer 

 changing stock every year. One torn is sufficient for twelve 

 hens, and more may be used with perfect safety. I would 

 keep more hens than most farmers' wives _do, and instead 

 of breaking them up from sitting, I would let them sit on 

 their own eggs, or if preferred, I would set the eggs 

 part under the domestic hen, giving all the young to 

 the turkey hen, and if I did not care to keep over so many 

 hens 1 would sell the surplus after they had laid the early 

 eggs. I raise late turkeys, but if I were not a poultry fan- 

 cier, and were raising market poultry, I should not raise 

 late turkeys; early ones are much more profitable, they are 

 much hardier during the summer, and are not so apt to be 

 affected with the disease which takes off hundreds of young 

 turkeys in the fall. 



The farmer should learn that he needs good, strong 

 large-boned, vigorous breeding stock, such as will take on 

 flesh when he wishes to market them. Nobody wants a poor 

 turkey to eat and if the ten-pound one is fat and brings more 

 by the pound than the twenty pound one it still pays to have 

 the twenty-pound one, but when the marketman says he can 

 scarcely use the forty-pound ones at any price because only 

 hotels and large restaurants want them, the farmer has no 

 need for forty-pound young turkeys, as some demand. 



BREEDING FANCY TURKEYS. 



As to shape of torn and hens to breed from — I select 

 large head and feet, long body, long neck, held well up, and 

 a broad back and breast, with long shanks. A short turkey 

 will fatten earlier and look larger when not fully matured 

 than the rangy one, but the latter will make the weight at 

 maturity much heavier, and will produce larger turkeys. I 

 select hens the same way, yet if they are specially well 

 marked and good in weight I would not discard them if not 

 quite as tall as I like them to be when pullets. I am some- 

 times disappointed in pullets, but cannot remember that I 

 ever have been in a torn — pullets sometimes are no larger 

 at two than at one year old. They often stop growing at 

 one year, while a torn never does. Other pullets grow until 

 they are two and three years old. 



My method of mating is simply this: Select the very 

 best torn possible, and in females do not discard a very fine 

 marked one because it is not quite as large as desired. By 

 this I do not mean that 1 breed from small boned females. 

 There are some larger than others in all flocks of the same 

 age, and I should not advise the use in the breeding pen of an 

 undersized female, or a runt. Nor should I discard from my 

 breeding yard an extra large female because she is not quite 

 up in fancy points for the reason that the torn will overcome 

 to some extent the defects. The well marked female will 

 produce large stock from the mating with a large torn, and 

 the one not so well marked will produce evenly marked 

 young from the mating with a well marked torn. Yet these 

 must be exceptional cases, for it will not do for a fancier to 

 have many females in his breeding yard that are not well 

 marked and not very large. By undersized, we mean pullets, 

 for if at two years old a hen is not of average size I should 

 discard her unless there were some special point I wanted to 



