Turkeys Are American Originals
By Bunny Stamler
It’s a cool crisp morning and I’m sipping hot coffee on my friend’s country porch. Her house sits atop the highest point in the center of her acreage in the Texas Hill Country. The morning is quiet except for bird song and the recognizable gobble-gobble of wild turkeys.
They sound so close – just right over there. So I step quietly off the porch, coffee cup still in hand, following their gobbles to see if I can sneak a peek at these uniquely American birds.
My passage is easy in the light brush. The turkeys’ soft gobbling never stops, and I think I’m getting closer. But wait – now the gobbling is coming from my left. I step softly toward the sound, getting closer. Like unseen spirits, the turkeys have now trotted to my right. Try as I might, I never caught sight of the wily birds even though they obviously kept their sights on me.
Not so long ago, being called “a turkey” meant stupidity and cluelessness. But wild turkeys are anything but. Early Americans like Ben Franklin knew of their cunning and agility. Many people today know he preferred the wild turkey over the bald eagle as our official emblem. In a letter to his daughter in 1784, Franklin wrote: “For the truth the turkey is in comparison a much more respectable bird, and withal a true original Native of America…”
With an average wingspan of more than 4-1/2 feet, wild turkeys can fly over 50 miles an hour. They can run at 25 mph. Males are much larger than females, averaging 18 pounds to the female’s eight pounds. At night they roost in trees. They do not migrate and so are year-round residents.
Hunting lowered populations to only 30,000 wild turkeys for all of the U.S. in the early 1900s. But protection, breeding and reintroduction programs have raised that number today to a healthy wild population of seven million.
By contrast, 300 million domestic turkeys, descendents from the wild turkeys, grace our tables each year. Their natural intelligence and flying ability have been bred out of them. Most of these domestic turkeys have white feathers, but there are “barnyard turkeys” still clothed in the dark plumage of their wild cousins.
Though they normally avoid people, wild turkeys have taken up residence in some urban areas like golf courses and reportedly in New York City’s Central Park. Our local wild turkey population disappeared in the 1940s due to hunting during World War II. But now you don’t have to drive all the way to the Hill Country to see wild turkeys.
In 1994 about two dozen wild turkeys were released at the Armand Bayou Nature Center. According to Mark Kramer, the center’s wildlife steward, wild turkeys have been sighted ever since. With a lifespan of only three to four years in the wild, this means the native turkeys are successfully reproducing, making this reintroduction an urban nature success story. I myself have seen wild turkeys grazing in the tall grass along Space Center Blvd. across from the Johnson Space Center.
True to their wily nature, Mark says you’re more likely to hear the familiar gobble-gobble of the wild turkeys at the nature center before you actually see one. Once you see them though, you’ll understand the respect wise old Ben Franklin had for these true American originals.
Nature Note: The Houston Audubon Society’s bird sanctuaries at High Island were devastated Sept.13 by Hurricane Humberto, causing more damage than even Hurricane Rita. To help restore these natural habitats, you can donate your time on any of these scheduled workdays: Dec. 8, Jan. 12, Feb. 9 and March 8. Call Houston Audubon at 713-932-1639 for schedules. Or mail a tax-free donation to The Houston Audubon Society, 440 Wilchester Blvd., Houston, TX 77079. Memo your check “High Island.” A donation made in someone else’s name also makes a meaningful gift for the nature lover on your list, the bird sanctuaries, and for you, the giver.
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