Fearing potential food poisoning, hundreds of Harrington Hundreds fresh turkeys had to be destroyed only days before Christmas ? much to the disappointment of local families who had pre-ordered birds for their Yule tide feasts.

?Sometimes a product comes in which is simply not of good quality,? said Anthony Aguiar, the owner of Harrington Hundreds Grocery store in Smiths, who said that it was ?unfortunate? that on Tuesday ? the day before Christmas Eve ? he was forced to recall and destroy a product which could affect his customers? Christmas.

?We sampled one of the birds to examine the quality of it, as we always do, and ran through some common sense checks for colour and odour,? he said, explaining that it was found that the entirety of the shipment was of ?borderline? quality.

?This is disappointing but not cataclysmic,? said Mr. Aguiar. ?I had a bad shipment, that?s all.?

Mr. Aguiar added that only one of his two shipments of fresh turkeys was being recalled. ?I don?t believe this is an island wide epidemic or anything, it?s just that my one shipment was mishandled somewhere along the way.?

He said that he did not suspect that the fault lay with his local supplier, rather with the American company who handled the turkeys originating from Virginia. But Mr. Aguiar said that he was pleased that he was able to maintain the standards of his meat, and prevented any of his customers from potentially becoming sick over the Christmas holiday.

?My meat man was vigilant and brought the issue to my attention,? said Mr. Aguiar, who said he quickly took steps to ensure his customers would not suffer any ill effects as a result of a contaminated turkey.

?Most of the turkeys had been pre-ordered, so we had a list of contacts who we had to regrettably inform them about our decision.?

But Mr. Aguiar added that he had indeed sold a few tainted turkeys before making the decision to halt sales.

?We have got back 99.999 percent of the turkeys,? he said, explaining that he knew most of his customers by name and had contacted all of those who had bought one of the turkeys in question.

?I actually had three customers calling to thank me today, saying it was refreshing to find that I had put their welfare over our sales.?

?I?m disappointed that my own fresh turkey won?t be on my table this Christmas,? said Mr. Aguiar, who added that he thought he had made the best decision to ensure the trust of his customers, even if it meant them buying their turkey at rival groceries.

At the other grocery stores across the Island, several sales representatives said that they had been approached by customers with questions about sub-standard turkeys but said that the problem found at Harrington Hundreds was an isolated case.

?We don?t use the same supplier as Harrington Hundreds,? said a Miles Market representative, who added that ?there?s no bones with Miles? turkeys.?

The Supermart and the Market Place echoed these sentiments, with a Marketplace representative saying that all of their stores only carry Perdue Fresh Turkeys, which is a different brand from the Harrington Hundreds? which the representative described as ?generic?.