Wild Turkey

Wild Turkey. Almost our national emblem , Meleagris gallopavo. , Benjamin Franklin considered the native wild turkey such a noble bird that he proposed it as the symbol of our new bird that he proposed it as the symbol of our new nation. Traveling in small flocks, wild turkeys scratch the forest floor for insects, nuts, plants, and seeds. They use their keen eyesight and hearing to detect danger. When threatened by a predator, the flock explodes, scattering and flying to safety in all directions. In the spring, male gobblers court the hens using their brightly colored heads and an exaggerated display of fanning their tails, strutting, gobbling, and hissing. Wild turkeys lay their eggs in leaf-lined depressions in the ground, and the young turkeys, or poults, are able to follow their mothers soon after hatching., By the early 1900s, eastern wild turkeys were nearly eliminated over much of their original range. Regrowth of logged areas, new laws promoting wildlife conservation, and the trapping and transfer of wild turkeys to suitable habitat have reestablished healthy populations. Wild turkeys are now found in the hardwood and mixed forests throughout much of the eastern United States.