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THE STORY of THE TURKEY FARM

Owners Marilyn and Bob Neal and the crews who have worked here over the years built The Turkey Farm into Maine's largest Turkey farm. In 2011, The Turkey Farm entered its 26th year. Also in 2011, Marilyn entered her 69th year and Bob entered his 72nd year. Age and health have forced us to reduce the scale of the farm.

Our farm has thrived on repeat business. We have more than 100 sharers in Community Agriculture and we sell at farmers markets in Brunswick (year-round) and South Portland (May-October). At Thanksgiving, more than 80 percent of our customers return each year. We believe they come back because of the taste and texture of our Turkeys.

And, while we have scaled back, the taste and texture of our Turkeys will not change because our philosophy of farming has not changed.

Our 60 acres have about seven acres of fenced range, and we rotate ranges so that none is occupied by Turkeys for more than 24 months in 60. For parts of every season, each range lies fallow so the perennial grasses and other growth can rejuvenate after Turkeys have been on the range. We try to populate the ranges at no more than 350 adult Turkeys per acre, about 125 square feet per bird.

The litter from the farm's brooderhouse, where Turkeys spend their first few weeks until their feathers have grown in to insulate them from the weather, is composted and spread on the family's garden and sold to other gardeners.

Since 2001, The Turkey Farm has used only feed that is certified to be free of genetically engineered grains. To our knowledge, no other farm in New England has taken this step.

Using genetically clean feed is in keeping with our philosophy of walking lightly on the land. We believe that genetic engineering works more to the advantage of the corporations that own the seed patents than to the animals and people who eat the food. And, so far, the yields with genetically modified seed don't surpass the yields of conventional seed. We also fear that not enough is known about such effects as drifting for genetically modified feed to be assuredly safe. The price of genetically clean feed is about 13 percent higher than conventional feed, and since 2006, the cost of our feed has nearly tripled, owing mostly to the federal mandate to use feed corn to produce ethanol, which has driven the price of corn from less than $3 a bushel to sometimes more than $8.

We raise our Turkeys as close to naturally as we can, and we operate our farm as sustainably as we can. Click on Newsletter, Spring 2011, to read about or efforts at sustainability.
We get the taste and texture that bring customers back again and again by raising and processing our birds differently from those of big-store growers. Starting with the commitment to free ranging our birds, we stay as natural as we can. We give our birds no routine antibiotics, although we will treat sick or clearly threatened birds with whatever medications appear most likely to help.
We last used antibiotics farm-wide in 2004, at the end of an outbreak of fowl cholera. At the end of the 2010 season, we had another outbreak of cholera and applied first penicillin and then oxy-tetracycline to three of our six flocks. We have not had to use any medications in 2011. We never use hormones, which are illegal for poultry.

At slaughter, we add no chemical "flavor enhancers" to the meat. We don't have to. Conventional Turkeys may contain up to 8.5 percent (1.7 pounds in a 20-pound bird) of a chemical broth intended to add flavor.

We are a local business, and we try to buy locally anything that we can't raise on the farm. Click on Newsletter, Spring 2010, to find out more about our local orientation.
The Turkey Farm had its beginnings in 1980 when Marilyn and Bob Neal came to New Sharon, hoping to make their living from the land. Bob had had a 20-year career in newspapers and for the first three years in Maine, he farmed and taught journalism at the University of Maine. Marilyn and Bob have two sons, Robbie, who was 8 when the family moved here, and Chris, who was 4. Both live in Portland, and neither wants to assume operation of the farm when their parents get done. Marilyn worked in records-keeping in the home-health industry for13 years before joining the farm crew in 2002.

As subsistence farmers, the Neals grew a little of everything, including a full line of vegetables, most of which they sold at farmers markets, and poultry and pork. But subsistence farming is a difficult choice both for the wallet and the lifestyle. "Do you know how many radishes you have to pull to make a living?" Bob asked fellow back-to-the-landers. After six years of augmenting farm income by working out, Bob reduced the outside workload to part-time and began to concentrate on Turkeys.
In 1986, he and Marilyn started 100 Turkeys, 91 making it to market weight, and all sold at the farm for Thanksgiving and Christmas. The Turkey Farm was on its way.

The next year, we grew 300 Turkeys and the next, 800. In 1989, we raised the bar too high and raised 2,200, distributing a great many to stores at wholesale prices that turned out to be way too low, and the farm lost $15,000 (nearly $7 a bird). "Wow," one farmer said, "I thought you had to raise sheep to lose that much money per animal."

The farm cut back to 1,400 birds the next year and then resumed gradual growth until it peaked in 1994 at 4,400. The total flock fluctuated between 3,300 and 4,100 for 11 seasons, then settled in at 3,200 for several years. This year it will be about 2,100.

In 1987, the farm started its food concession, which may be where most people have learned about us. We sold dinners and sandwiches for 21 years at the Fryeburg Fair, where we won the prize in 1998 for best food. Click on Newsletter, Summer, 2011, to read more about our time at Fryeburg. We tried out more than a dozen fairs and shows before settling in 2000 on Fryeburg as the one major show for our food concession.

In 1989, The Turkey Farm began selling what are called further-processed items to stores, primarily natural-food and always locally owned stores. The further-processed items (see list) gradually became a major part of the business, and kept the farm in production year-round. We continued wholesaling until health forced us to retrench to retail only in 2010. Today, we continue to pack the 40 or so further-processed items for sale at retail at the farm and at farmers markets.

In 1990, we became the second farm in Maine to offer Community Supported Agriculture. Under Community Supported Agriculture, sharers pay up-front for their food and then collect (with
interest) as the harvest comes in. Click on Newsletter, Summer 2011, to learn more about our CSA and how to join.

Our farmstore on Route 27 in New Sharon began as the front room of our slaughterhouse, which was built in 1990. The carpenters were finishing in the front room as we began processing Thanksgiving Turkeys in the back room that year. Two years later, using a loan from Coastal Enterprises, Inc., we built a 1,008-square-foot brooderhouse where our birds begin their lives. The house is heated with propane stoves to warm the baby Turkeys, which we pick up at hatcheries the day of hatch, until their feathers grow in.

Two years later, we added to the slaughterhouse so we'd have more room for processing, and three years after that, we built a 576-square-foot ell onto the plant to be our farmstore.

Our farm symbol came to us in 1998 when our son Robbie painted a mural that we display in our farmstore. From that mural, we took the image of The Versatile Turkey, a Tom Turkey who balances on a rolling ball while juggling plates, rings and ten-pins, and made it our farm logo.

In 1999, we knew we would have to expand our refrigeration, so we bought a refrigerator truck, which we could use for deliveries and for stationary storage. Three years later, we bought a second reefer truck, which we use for cold storage at the farm at Thanksgiving. A third reefer truck joined our fleet in 2006.

Since 2007, Marilyn has been fighting ovarian cancer, and in 2010, Bob suffered a heart attack. Obviously, we had to cut back our farming. For the future, our business is limited to retail sales here at the farm and at the farmers markets in Brunswick and South Portland. We intend to keep growing Turkeys for at least a few more seasons.