THE centrepiece of most family's Christmas lunch, the turkey, is hatching out about now. Slower-growing heritage breeds - like free-range Kelly Bronze, that take between 25 and 30 weeks to grow to a dressed weight of 16-25lbs, will have been hatched in the latter half of June, while faster-growing hybrids - such as Broad Breasted Bronze and Giant Whites, that are ready for slaughter at 16-22 weeks of age, will be hatched in late August/early September.

While turkeys are consumed all year round in the UK, the majority of the 17m slaughtered in the UK every year - 10m of them - are destined for the Christmas trade.

My father was a vet before he became a farmer, and the local knackery gave him a freshly-killed turkey every year to thank him for directing fallen livestock their way. He used to spend an evening plucking the 3,500 or so feathers from it, before singeing it over a shovel containing burning methylated spirits.

In those far-off days of my childhood, turkeys were still an unaffordable luxury for many.

In the 1930s it took a whole week to earn the wages for a turkey. Today it takes us just 1.7 hours.

It was the late Bernard Mathews who effectively made turkey affordable. He developed intensive methods of rearing them in the 1950s, but it was a trip to the US that prompted his vision for the freezer revolution that transformed the demand for oven-ready turkeys in the 1960s and 70s. This freezer revolution meant he was able to produce turkeys all-year-round, freeze them and offer people a frozen Christmas turkey year after year.

In the 1970s, he also introduced the Turkey Breast Roast, which was a convenient product that made turkey easier to serve and eat, affordable to all and no longer a once-a-year Christmas treat.

Turkeys originated from Mexico and then expanded into North America, where American Indians hunted them for their meat, and used their feathers for arrows.

It is believed that turkeys were first brought to Britain in 1526 by Yorkshire man William Strickland, who had acquired six birds from American/Indian traders on his travels, and then sold them for tuppence each in Bristol.

Today's turkeys bear little resemblance to those original imports. Indeed, modern strains of turkeys have such large breasts that the male, or stag as he is called, can't mate naturally with the female, or hen. As a result, breeders use artificial insemination to get fertile eggs for incubation.

Turkey poults - that's when they have started to grow feathers and no longer require the comfort of heaters to keep warm - are feckless creatures that can be as prone to dying as sheep.

Apart from all the diseases that can afflict young turkeys, they also have the disadvantage of possessing 360-degree vision allowing them to see more than is good for them. They also have exceptionally good hearing.

Being highly strung, they're easily frightened and will take flight at almost anything out of the ordinary. Frightened turkeys will huddle together, or pile on top of each other in a corner and smother weaker ones.

Others collide with walls and feeders and bruise themselves. They often appear to be none the worse for their accident until they are plucked. Turkeys with bruises on their breast don't look appetising and are almost impossible to sell.

Growing free-range turkeys like Kelly Bronze is becoming a popular diversification for some farmers. They can be kept under cover in empty lambing sheds or polytunnels, and allowed out during the day in adjacent paddocks. After Christmas, the sheds can then be used for housing sheep in the run-up to lambing.

Producing slower-growing, free-range, heritage breeds costs a lot more than intensively-reared, fast-growing hybrids, but they command a premium from discerning buyers.

On top of costs like heating, feed, litter, shavings and labour, there is also plucking, processing, packaging and distribution.

Intensively reared birds, destined to be frozen, are wet-plucked - that's where they are immersed in hot water before having their feathers removed mechanically by rotating rubber "fingers".

More expensive, free-range birds that are hung for a couple of weeks after slaughter can't be wet-plucked, but have to be dry-plucked by hand. That adds a considerable cost, as it takes a skilled plucker about half-an-hour or more to pluck a turkey.

Despite all that, with lower feed costs as a result of the global surplus of grain, Christmas turkeys should be profitable this year.