REEDERS, Pa. — We are just three weeks from Thanksgiving, and it's already shaping up to be an expensive one.
Not only is the main course in short supply, but turkey will also be more costly.
At Jackson View Farms near Reeders, the sound of gobbling turkeys comes with your visit this time of year.
Jennifer Smith owns the farm with her husband. She says turkeys will be harder to come by this year because of the avian flu, and you'll also be spending more on it.
"The price of feed has gone up at least $5 to $6 a 50-pound bag, compared to what it was before 2020. So, unfortunately, you know that makes the price of the bird go up so that we can cover the cost to raise them as well as the cost it takes to process them. So we're at $5 a pound this year for our birds."
While the price of a Thanksgiving turkey this year will be higher, Smith says spending your money on a fresh bird will stretch your dollars further.
"A fresh turkey is actually going to give you more weight per pound of meat as opposed to a frozen turkey from the grocery store. So, we try and tell our customers that if you want a 20-pound bird, we're going to give you a 20-pound bird, not a 23-pound bird, because you will lose some water weight with the birds from the grocery store."
Smith already has 97 turkeys sold for the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday, with only a handful left. She says some farms this year may struggle with getting people bigger birds, but she won't be one of them.
"My order for these birds went in, in February, so these birds aren't even a twinkle in anyone's eye in February. So, we're very fortunate we were able to do that. But for people that maybe do a smaller hatch or even farms that do thousands of birds, if they don't hatch them out themselves, trying to get them acquired has been extremely difficult."
Smith says no matter where you buy your turkey, order it now, so you know you have one for Thanksgiving.
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