What Our Turkeys Eat & Why They’re the Best for Your Thanksgiving

At Dutch Meadows, just like all animals that grace our property, we believe turkeys should live in harmony with the land, as if they’re roaming free. They should have access to the elements they would naturally eat and relish in. 

That’s why we continue to partner with one of our farmer neighbors, Christ Zook, that is committed to raising pastured turkeys using the same principals that we adhere to on our farm. 

The turkeys are raised all natural on pasture. They are heritage breed turkeys that do very well on grass. Although turkeys are excellent foragers, they cannot survive on insects and native plants alone. To supplement what they may not be able to find on the land, especially as the seasons change, Christ also offers the turkey a soy free and non-GMO feed. 

The combination of Christ’s specially formulated feed and the protein that the turkeys naturally forage from the land, gives the turkey a flavor that can’t compare to what you find in the grocery store. This isn’t hard to believe, even without a taste test, once you’re exposed to the truth about the average non-pastured, commercialized turkeys.

Turkeys that you find in your average grocery store were raised in factories, not on the grassy meadows of a farm. These turkeys are crowded into poorly ventilated industrial production facilities. Crowding at this level can cause turkeys to injure each other with their beaks and toes so the factory producers often have portions of their beaks and toes removed at a young age, an extremely painful and tortuous procedure. The removal of their beak hinders their ability to forage but that’s not entirely relevant in this case because factory turkey are not given the chance to. They are often fed a steady diet of corn-based grain feed laced with antibiotics. Pesticides are also widely used to inhibit the spread of disease. Many recent health reports have shown that we really are what we eat and these unnatural, harmful elements consumed by the turkey are also causing harm to humans when they consume them. 

The solution is simple. Go directly to the farm. Not the factory.