The Yield of Edible Meat from Turkeys, Ducklings, and Different Market Classes of Chickens

IT HAS always been a problem of producers, distributors, and consumers to determine the economy of various meats offered for sale. Poultry meats have become more important to our eating habits with recurring periods of “red meat” shortages and high prices. A “year round” supply of young, rapidly grown, domesticated fowls is now available to the consumer on many markets. Experiments have been conducted at the University of Illinois in which the dressing percentages, New York and eviscerated, and the percentages of edible meat (lean, fat, skin and giblets) were determined for five market classes of grade A chickens (Brown and Bean, 1950) and with nine week old White Pekin ducklings (Broadbent and Bean, 1951a). Similar work has been done elsewhere with turkeys. A compilation of this material has been made (Broadbent and Bean, 1951b). The birds of these three species were handled in a similar manner. They were given . . .