Kent producer repeats success at traditional turkey show

For the second year in a row, Cottage Farm Turkeys in Kent, England, took top honors at the Anglian Turkey Association’s annual show at Stoke-by-Nayland — now the only survivor of the once flourishing regional traditional turkey shows.
The ATA event, which attracts entries from across East Anglia and the South East, retains all the traditions with turkeys “shown plucked” in the way they once hung outside butchers’ shops and then roast turkeys piped into the dining hall in the way that haggis is ceremonially introduced at Burns Night suppers.
Cottage Farm Turkeys, based in Cudham, won the championship with the winner of the over 8 kg hen class, and also collected trophies for the best brace of white turkeys, oven-ready under 11 kg and butcher’s retail presentation.
The family business, founded by former teacher Phil Baxter, rears turkeys around the year including 3,000 for Christmas and combines farming with a substantial butchery business at Polhill Garden Centre, Badgers Mount, Sevenoaks, which also supplies meat to more than 400 caterers, restaurants, pubs and schools.
The entries were judged by Tom Copas, one of the leading producers of traditional turkeys. He awarded other trophies to F W Weeks of Laylands Farm, Downham, Essex, (stag under 11 kg and hen under 5.5 kg), Phil Hunter of Yew Tree Farm, Fressingfield, Suffolk (hen 5.5 to 8 kg), and Ian Wylie of Carlton, Newmarket (brace of bronze turkeys).
“Once again, the standard of the birds was excellent and a champion hard to find,” said James Marriage, show organizer and director of W & H Marriage & Sons. “The ATA is grateful for the support shown by the region’s turkey farmers, particularly at this busy time of the year for them.”
In addition the Goodchild trophy — named after a well-known Smithfield wholesaler in the 1960s and 1970s — was presented to Stephen Lister, a partner in Crowshall Veterinary Services at Attleborough.
Making the presentation, ATA President Derek Kelly spoke of Lister’s valued services over more than 35 years to the traditional farm fresh turkey sector, backyard poultry keeper as well as the wider poultry industry. A past president of the Turkey Club of Great Britain, Lister is one of the founders of the Crowshall specialist poultry practice and is currently chairman of the organizing committee of the Egg & Poultry Industry Conference and UK secretary for the World Poultry Science Association.