A NORTH Yorkshire farmer is selling fully fledged organic turkeys for the first time this Christmas.

Mr Steven Peirson of Hook House Farm, Kirkby Fleetham, began his turkey enterprise ten years ago with just 20 birds. Such has been the success of the business that today he has 400 turkeys ready for the Christmas market - all reared to Soil Association and Traditional Farm Fresh Turkey Association standards.

His bronze-feathered turkeys are produced on a free range system. They arrive at the farm as day old chicks in June and stay indoors under heat for four to five weeks, depending on the weather. They are then allowed out into a large paddock during the day, going indoors at night.

The birds are fed on organic feed but out in the field behave naturally and enjoy eating insects and worms.

"They string out across the field in a line looking for food - a bit like policemen searching for clues," said Mr Peirson.

The birds are slaughtered mid-December and sold at weights of 10-25lb at an average £6/kg.

Mr Peirson is licensed to slaughter them and uses a quick electric current. The bird is picked up, its head placed through a cone and electrodes attached.

"They have the minimum of stress, they are alive one moment and dead the next," he said. "They are then bled, hand plucked dry and hung by the feet for at least seven days. The TFTA insists on that, not the Soil Association."

The whole 60-hectare farm is under conversion to organic production and also has lamb available. The lamb is raised on land under conversion and will be marketed as fully organic in the winter of 2003.

Crops will be organic next year but the first crop of spring barley grown without sprays or fertilisers has been harvested.

Mr Peirson was immediately struck by the different types of weeds which grew with the crop. They led to an immediate upsurge in bird life looking for insects and seeds. An increase in cereal stubbles left unploughed has also provided food and shelter for birds such as skylarks.

The farm is in a ten-year countryside stewardship scheme and has created tussocky grass margins round arable fields to provide shelter and food for birds and other wildlife.

A special grass mixture has also been sown on an area of wet land, which was previously cropped, to create a new habitat for birds such as lapwings.

Hedges and trees have continued to be planted. The hedges are trimmed every other year and then only in winter, to allow small birds to feed on fruit and berries.

Turkeys are mainly sold directly from the farm although they are also available through Cockburns butchers in Bedale, from Great Northern Wines in Blossomgate, Ripon, and The Village Bakery at Melmerby, near Penrith. The local Low Leazes organic box scheme also supplies them, along with North East Organic Growers in Bedlington.

For more information or to order an organic turkey can contact Mr Peirson on 01609 748498 or e-mail hookhousefarm