Commercial turkeys experience welfare problems arising from rapid growth, high stocking density and selection for extreme breast muscle development. Understanding these issues guides consumer and policy responses.
Commercial turkey production involves a suite of welfare compromises arising from extreme genetic selection and intensive management. The development of such extreme breast musculature that natural mating is impossible represents a fundamental departure from the animal's biological integrity. The inability to perform normal locomotion, mating and dust-bathing behaviours in barren, crowded sheds represents chronic welfare deprivation. Beak trimming, while reducing injury from pecking, causes acute pain during the procedure and may cause chronic neuropathic pain at the trimmed stump. The broad welfare failure in intensive turkey production receives less public attention than equivalent broiler chicken issues despite comparable scale.