TURKEYS 



31 



tancc and concluding by expelling the air with 

 a variety of cackling, cliuckling, (jr rumbling 

 sounds. 



In May wlun the song of the Sage Thrush 

 begins, the mating of the Sage Hens is about 

 over. Then the females make their nests, often 

 near some spring or stream. The mother bird on 

 the nest is a difficult object to see. She seems 

 to know it and sits very close. For this reason 

 she is regarded as foolish and sometimes is 

 known as " fool hen." The little ones are ready 

 to run about fifteen minutes after they leave die 

 shell, so Burnett informs us, are colored like 

 little Turkeys, and " peep " similarly. Also they 

 have a plaintive whistle, ra-do-ra-do. At night 

 they nestle themselves under the mother's wings, 

 only a row of little heads showing outside. As the 

 summer wanes, the Sage Hens and their well- 

 grown yoimg often spend the days on flats, near 

 streams or near water holes. By November the 

 young are full-grown, but are lighter in color 

 than their mother. 



The Sage Grouse seldom is to be found far 

 from the sagebrush. Where this grows high 



along the river bottoms the birds often lie 

 closely and they match their environment in 

 color, so that the hunter may walk into the midst 

 of a brood without seeing them and they may rise 

 on all sides. They labor into the air with noisy 

 wings, but fly fast when well under way. 

 \\ here they have been much hunted they are 

 likely to rise beyond gunsluji and start for the 

 horizon. 



Late in the season when they have become 

 wary they assemble in " packs." In winter they 

 are said to retire from some exposed localities to 

 the valleys or to the shelter of the timber. Al- 

 though they feed largely on the leaves of the 

 sage, insects form a considerable part of the 

 food of the young, and in some regions they 

 attack grain, alfalfa, and garden plants. Their 

 habits are such that they are exposed to the in- 

 clemency of the weather, which ordinarily seems 

 to affect them little. Sometimes, however, they 

 become drenched by severe rains so that they are 

 unable to rise from the ground. Hailstorms 

 sometimes kill the young and even the full-grown 

 birds. EuvvAKD Howe Fokbush. 



TURKEYS 



Order Gallina ; suborder Phasiani; family Meleagridcs 



HE Turkeys are distinctively American birds. Formerly ranked as a separate 

 family, they are now regarded as the only native American representatives of 

 the Pheasant family. They are confined to North America and to Central 

 America, and the only species now recognized are the Common Turkey, of 

 which the ornithologists describe five forms — Merriam's Turkey {Meleagris 

 gallopavo mcrriami), the Florida Turkey {Meleagris gallopavo osceola), the 

 Rio Grande Turkey (Meleagris gallopavo intermedia), the American Wild 

 Turkey (Meleagris gallopavo silvestris) and the type species which is not found 

 in the United States — and the Yucatan Ocellated Turkey, smaller but with 

 even more brilliant plumage. Our Common Turkey is still found in a slightly 

 different form in Mexico, whence it was introduced into Europe about 1530. 

 Elon H. Eaton remarks that " the scientific name of the family is a misnomer, being 

 the original name of the Guinea Hen, and if the popular impression of the origin of the 

 common name is correct, this is a misnomer also, but it is probable, as has been suggested, 

 that the common name has reference to the call note of the bird, which resembles the syllables 

 turk, ttirk, turk." 



Turkeys have the head and neck naked except for a few stiff bristles, and wrinkled 

 and wattled, with an erectile process growing on the forehead. The tarsus is naked, covered 

 with scales, and, in the male, spttrrcd. The tail is broad and rounded with fourteen to 

 eighteen blunt feathers. The male has a " beard " of coarse black bristles hanging from the 

 center of upper breast. 



