In association with by James Cossins
Keeping poultry can be ‘fowl’ through winter bird flu season
VOICE OF A FARMER A Rawston Farm turkey. Two interesting turkey facts for you: only male turkeys gobble, and their poop identifies their gender (a male’s poop will be shaped like the letter J, while the female’s is more spiral-shaped!)
A surge in people keeping their own poultry during the lock-down egg shortage could be why ‘bird flu’ is spreading from wild to domestic fowl, argues James Cossins Here at Rawston farm we are all year. This year has been the about producing and sourcing worst the UK has seen, with local. We don’t just rear our own currently 80 outbreaks across the beef; we also rear own Christmas country, and it’s not only in wild turkeys for the butchery and birds but also domestic birds. shop. With current bird flu regulations, We were pleased with the DEFRA advice is to keep all quality of our turkeys and have poultry inside or netted to received positive feedback from prevent wild birds from coming customers. This is what gives me into contact with poultry and to great pleasure in rearing our own prevent wild birds from using turkeys - it is of huge concern the same food and water source. to us that we ensure a good Please look at DEFRA’s website Christmas dinner for you. for more information. But rearing turkeys does have its challenges: one night we had Guarantee of high quality a visit from Mr Fox who beat us As an Arla Milk producer we get to the birds’ evening lock-up and regular audits from independent sadly took five turkeys as an early vets to look at our cattle from a Christmas dinner. Greedy! health and welfare prospective. The winter is a This ensures that all challenging time Arla’s milk can be sold “Mr Fox beat for all poultry with a guarantee of high us to the birds’ standards. As a producer producers and hobbyists evening lock-up we keep records of any should be and sadly took health problems that aware too. may occur. five turkeys as an All medicines we use During covid, early Christmas are recorded on a with a national shortage of dinner. Greedy!” computerised system. eggs, many Our own vet from the people wanting Damory Vet Practice has their own eggs bought chickens worked out our total medicine and ducks. useage for the last year and Bird flu (also known as avian determined whether our usage influenza) is rife at this time of has changed and also how we 58
compare with the other dairy producers within the practice. Our audit takes place next week and we are hoping that we meet their necessary requirements to continue with our Arla milk contract. In the past vets have been helpful in advising where we can improve on any particular issues that we face. They are keen to see records where we have had the cows independently scored for mobility (for example, is there any lameness present) and the overall appearance of our cattle. Let’s hope for a positive outcome! Winter feeding We do out-winter some animals on a forage crop and bales of straw and silage. So far, this winter has been kind to them, apart from the wet period over Christmas. We always try to choose free draining fields with hedges for shelter and often they can be in a more healthy environment than animals kept inside buildings through the winter. As we move through February the days are finally getting longer, and hopefully there will no more bad winter weather.
