Meleagris gallopavo

The wild turkey (''Meleagris gallopavo'') is an upland ground bird native to North America, one of two extant species of turkey and the heaviest member of the order Galliformes. It is the ancestor to the domestic turkey, which was originally derived from a southern Mexican subspecies of wild turkey (not the related ocellated turkey).

Description

Adult wild turkeys have long reddish-yellow to grayish-green legs. The body feathers are generally blackish and dark, sometimes grey brown overall with a coppery sheen that becomes more complex in adult males. Adult males, called toms or gobblers, have a large, featherless, reddish head, red throat, and red wattles on the throat and neck. The head has fleshy growths called caruncles. Juvenile males are called jakes; the difference between an adult male and a juvenile is that the jake has a very short beard and his tail fan has longer feathers in the middle. The adult male's tail fan feathers will be all the same length. When males are excited, a fleshy flap on the bill (called a snood) expands, and this, the wattles and the bare skin of the head and neck all become engorged with blood. Each foot has three toes in front, with a shorter, rear-facing toe in back; males have a spur behind each of their lower legs.

Male turkeys have a long, dark, fan-shaped tail and glossy bronze wings. As with many other species of the Galliformes, turkeys exhibit strong sexual dimorphism. The male is substantially larger than the female, and his feathers have areas of red, purple, green, copper, bronze, and gold iridescence. The preen gland ( uropygial gland) is also larger in male turkeys compared to female ones. In contrast to the majority of other birds, they are colonized by bacteria of unknown function (''Corynebacterium uropygiale''). Females, called hens, have feathers that are duller overall, in shades of brown and gray. Parasites can dull coloration of both sexes; in males, coloration may serve as a signal of health. The primary wing feathers have white bars. Turkeys have 5000 to 6000 feathers.

Tail feathers are of the same length in adults, different lengths in juveniles. Males typically have at least one "beard", a tuft of coarse hair-like filaments ( mesofiloplumes), growing from the center of the breast. Beards grow continuously during the turkey's lifespan and a one-year-old male has a beard up to long. Approximately 10% of females have a beard, usually shorter and thinner than that of the male.

The adult male (or "tom") normally weighs from and measures in length. The adult female (or "hen") is typically much smaller at and is long. Per two large studies, the average weight of adult males is and the average weight of adult females is .''CRC Handbook of Avian Body Masses'' by John B. Dunning Jr. (Editor). CRC Press (1992), .''CRC Handbook of Avian Body Masses, 2nd Edition'' by John B. Dunning Jr. (Editor). CRC Press (2008), . The wings are relatively small, as is typical of the galliform order, and the wingspan ranges from . The wing chord is only . The bill is also relatively small, as adults measure in culmen length. The tarsus of the wild turkey is quite long and sturdy, measuring from . The tail is also relatively long, ranging from .

The record-sized adult male wild turkey, according to the National Wild Turkey Federation, weighed , with records of tom turkeys weighing over uncommon but not rare. While it is usually rather lighter than the waterfowl, after the trumpeter swan (''Cygnus buccinator''), the turkey has the second heaviest maximum weight of any North American bird. Going on average mass, several other birds on the continent, including the American white pelican (''Pelecanus erythrorhynchos''), the tundra swan (''Cygnus columbianus columbianus'') and the very rare California condor (''Gymnogyps californianus'') and whooping crane (''Grus americana'') surpass the mean weight of turkeys.

Habitat

Wild turkeys prefer hardwood and mixed conifer-hardwood forests with scattered openings such as pastures, fields, orchards and seasonal marshes. They seemingly can adapt to virtually any dense native plant community as long as coverage and openings are widely available. Open, mature forest with a variety of interspersion of tree species appear to be preferred. In the Northeast of North America, turkeys are most profuse in hardwood timber of oak-hickory ('' Quercus''-'' Carya'') and forests of red oak (''Quercus rubra''), beech ('' Fagus grandifolia''), cherry (''Prunus serotina'') and white ash ('' Fraxinus americana''). Best ranges for turkeys in the Coastal Plain and Piedmont sections have an interspersion of clearings, farms, and plantations with preferred habitat along principal rivers and in cypress ('' Taxodium distichum'') and tupelo (''Nyssa sylvatica'') swamps.

In Appalachian and Cumberland plateaus, birds occupy mixed forest of oaks and pines on southern and western slopes, also hickory with diverse understories. Bald cypress and sweet gum ('' Liquidambar styraciflua'') swamps of s. Florida; also hardwood of ''Cliftonia'' (a heath) and oak in north-central Florida. Lykes Fisheating Creek area of s. Florida has up to 51% cypress, 12% hardwood hammocks, 17% glades of short grasses with isolated live oak ('' Quercus virginiana''); nesting in neighboring prairies. Original habitat here was mainly longleaf pine ('' Pinus palustris'') with turkey oak ('' Quercus laevis'') and slash pine ('' Pinus caribaea'') "flatwoods," now mainly replaced by slash pine plantations.

Behavior

Flight

Despite their weight, wild turkeys, unlike their domesticated counterparts, are agile, fast fliers. In ideal habitat of open woodland or wooded grasslands, they may fly beneath the canopy top and find perches. They usually fly close to the ground for no more than 400 m (a quarter mile).

Wild turkeys have very good eyesight, but their vision is very poor at night. They will generally not see a predator until it is too late. At twilight most turkeys will head for the trees and roost well off the ground: it is safer to sleep there in numbers than to risk being victim to predators who hunt by night. Because wild turkeys don't migrate, in snowier parts of the species's habitat like the Northeast, Rockies, much of Canada, and the Midwest, it is very important for this bird to learn to select large conifer trees where they can fly onto the branches and shelter from blizzards.

Vocalizations

Wild turkeys have many calls: gobbles, plain yelp, cluck & purr, clucks, cutting, excited hen, fly down, tree yelp, old hen, kee kee, putts. In early spring, males older than a year old (called gobblers or toms) and, occasionally to a lesser extent, males younger than a year old (called "jakes") gobble to announce their presence to females and competing males. The gobble of a wild turkey can be heard up to a mile away. Males also emit a low-pitched "drumming" sound, produced by the movement of air in the air sac in the chest, similar to the booming of a prairie chicken. In addition they produce a sound known as the "spit" which is a sharp expulsion of air from this air sac.

Foraging

Wild turkeys are omnivorous, foraging on the ground or climbing shrubs and small trees to feed. They prefer eating acorns, nuts and other hard mast of various trees, including hazel, chestnut, hickory, and pinyon pine as well as various seeds, berries such as juniper and bearberry, buds, leaves, fern fronds, roots and insects. Turkeys also occasionally consume amphibians such as salamanders and small reptiles such as lizards and small snakes. Poults have been observed eating insects, berries, and seeds. Wild turkeys often feed in cow pastures, sometimes visit backyard bird feeders, and favor croplands after harvest to scavenge seeds on the ground. Turkeys are also known to eat a wide variety of grasses.

Turkey populations can reach large numbers in small areas because of their ability to forage for different types of food. Early morning and late afternoon are the desired times for eating.

Social structure and mating

Males are polygamous, mating with as many hens as they can. Male wild turkeys display for females by puffing out their feathers, spreading out their tails and dragging their wings. This behavior is most commonly referred to as strutting. Their heads and necks are colored brilliantly with red, white, and blue. The color can change with the turkey's mood, with a solid white head and neck being the most excited. They use gobbling, drumming/booming and spitting as signs of social dominance, and to attract females. Courtship begins during the months of March and April, which is when turkeys are still flocked together in winter areas.

Males may be seen courting in groups, often with the dominant male gobbling, spreading his tail feathers (strutting), drumming/booming and spitting. In a study, the average dominant male that courted as part of a pair of males fathered six more eggs than males that courted alone. Genetic analysis of pairs of males courting together shows that they are close relatives, with half of their genetic material being identical. The theory behind the team-courtship is that the less dominant male would have a greater chance of passing along shared genetic material than if it were courting alone.

When mating is finished, females search for nest sites. Nests are shallow dirt depressions engulfed with woody vegetation. Hens lay a clutch of 10–14 eggs, usually one per day. The eggs are incubated for at least 28 days. The poults are precocial and nidifugous, leaving the nest in about 12–24 hours.

Positive relationships with other wild species

Turkey are known to occasionally forage with deer and squirrels, and may even play with them. By foraging together, each can help the other watch for predators with their different senses: the deer with their improved olfactory sense, the turkey with its superior sight, and squirrels providing an additional set of eyes from the air.

Predators

Predators of eggs and nestlings include raccoons (''Procyon lotor''), Virginia opossums (''Didelphis virginiana''), striped skunks (''Mephitis mephitis''), gray foxes (''Urocyon citnereoargenteus''), groundhogs (''Marmota monax''), other rodents and spotted skunks (''Spilogale'' ssp.). Predators of poults in addition to nestlings and eggs also include several species of snake, namely rat snakes (''Elaphe'' ssp.), gopher snakes (''Pituophis catenifer'') and pinesnakes (''Pituophis'' ssp.).

Avian predators of poults include raptors such as bald eagles (''Haliaeetus leucocephalus''), barred owl (''Strix varia''), red-shouldered (''Buteo lineatus''), red-tailed (''Buteo jamaicensis''), white-tailed (''Geranoaetus albicaudatus''), and Harris's hawks (''Parabuteo unicinctus'')—and the smallish Cooper's hawk (''Accipiter cooperii'') and broad-winged hawk (''Buteo platypterus'') (both likely of very small poults). Mortality of poults is greatest in the first 14 days of life, especially of those roosting on the ground, decreasing most notably after half a year, when they attain near adult sizes.

In addition to poults, hens and adult-sized fledglings (but not, as far as is known, adult male toms) are vulnerable to predation by great horned owls (''Bubo virginianus''), northern goshawk (''Accipiter gentilis''), domestic dogs (''Canis familiaris''), domestic cats (''Felis catus''), and red foxes (''Vulpes vulpes''). Predators of both adults and poults include coyotes (''Canis latrans''), gray wolves (''Canis lupus''), bobcats (''Lynx rufus''), cougars (''Puma concolor''), Canada lynx ''(Lynx canadensis),'' golden eagles (''Aquila chrysaetos''), and possibly American black bears (''Ursus americanus''), which also will eat the eggs if they find them. The American alligator (''Alligator mississippiensis)'' is a predator to all turkeys of all ages in the Southeast and will eat them if they get too close to water. Humans are now the leading predator of adult turkeys. When approached by potential predators, turkeys and their poults usually run away rather than fly away from potential predators, though they may also fly short distances if pressed.

Occasionally, if cornered, adult turkeys may try to fight off predators and large male toms can be especially aggressive in self-defense. When fighting off predators, turkeys may kick with their legs, using the spurs on their back of the legs as a weapon, bite with their beak and ram with their relatively large bodies and may be able to deter predators up to the size of mid-sized mammals. Hen turkeys have been seen to chase off at least two species of hawks in flight when their poults are threatened.

Wild turkeys are not usually aggressive towards humans, but can be frightened or provoked to behave with aggression. They are most likely to attack if startled, cornered or harassed, or if approached too closely. They also have been seen to chase off humans as well. However, attacks and potential injuries can usually be avoided by giving wild turkeys a respectful amount of space and keeping outdoor spaces clean and undisturbed. Also, turkeys that are habituated to seeing people, at places like parks or campgrounds, can be very tame and will even feed from the hands of people. Male toms occasionally will attack parked cars and reflective surfaces, thinking they see another turkey and must defend their territory, but starting a car engine and moving the car is typically enough to scare it away.

Range and population

The wild turkey in the United States in 1957 ranged from Arizona to southeastern Oklahoma and thence through Tennessee, West Virginia, New York, and Ontario, and south to Florida and Texas. It formerly ranged north to southeastern South Dakota, southern Wisconsin, and southwestern Maine. The A.O.U. Checklist also described Upper Pliocene

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