For related articles and more information, please visit OCA’s CAFO’s vs. Free Range page.


Whether it’s turkeys or tomatoes, heirloom varieties are hot, hot, hot. More people are looking for foods that hark back to an era before industrial agriculture and genetic manipulation. You might be one of those people opting for a “heritage” turkey this Thanksgiving. But are you sure you’re getting a
real heritage turkey? SHOCKER: You might not be.

First of all, a quick lowdown on what heritage actually means: It does not mean
organic,
all natural, or
free range, though a true
heritage bird is probably all of those things. Heritage refers to 10 specific breeds of turkey (if you want to know what they are, click here). These breeds were raised in the U.S. prior to the 1950s, when the poultry industry began to genetically engineer (through cross breeding) the commodity, broad-breasted white turkeys most people eat today.

Heritage birds differ from broad-breasted whites in a number of ways: They’re smaller and prettier, often with elegant dark or colored feathers. They mature more slowly (24 to 30 weeks, versus about 12 to 18 weeks for a commodity turkey), and can live longer-up to 15 years, as opposed to a year and a half. Broad-breasted turkeys are engineered to grow so big that they cannot reproduce on their own, and at times even have trouble walking. Therefore, they must be artificially inseminated. Heritage birds can have sex normally, and have big, strong legs that can walk just fine. Heritage birds are gamier-tasting, have darker meat, and can be much tougher and harder to cook (we’ve got some tips here). They’re closer to wild birds than the mushier, whiter turkeys bred for obesity and early youth. And heritage birds are more expensive to raise, and more expensive per pound to buy.

So how do you know you’re getting a heritage bird? You don’t. There is no official certification program for the identification and labeling of heritage birds the way there is for organics. Although turkey producers are required to submit documentation to the USDA showing that the turkeys they’re going to call heritage are one of the officially recognized heritage breeds, this process is not as strict and regulated as needed to be dependably reliable. For instance: “I have seen people think they have heritage birds because they have dark feathers,” says Frank Reese, a heritage turkey farmer in Kansas. “But the color of the feathers don’t mean a thing.”