‘The phone still rings with people wanting to know if I have any turkeys’ – End of an era as hand-reared birds no longer reach customers

Jimmy Woulfe And Wayne O'connor 🕒︎ 2025-11-12

As avian flu threatens the mass-produced turkey market this Christmas, many small producers of free-range turkeys have already gone out of business due in part to increased regulations. For the first time in almost 50 years, Mary Breen’s farmyard in Cullen, on the Limerick-Tipperary border has fallen silent. Ms Breen traditionally produced up to 45 hand-reared free-range turkeys on the family dairy farm. But this year she has been forced to call a halt.

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