THE WiLp TURKEY: 
Meleagris gallopavo. 
Meleagris gallopavo silvestris. 
Meleagris gallopavo osceola. 
Meleagris gallopavo intermedia. 
Meleagris gallopavo merriamt. 
America has given to the world its largest game bird 
and perhaps most important domestic fowl—the turkey. 
It is purely American, and its ancestry goes back a long 
way, for it existed here in far-off Tertiary times, por- 
tions of the skeleton of a turkey having been found in 
the Miocene deposits of Colorado, and the bones of 
other species in the post-Pliocene of New Jersey. Of 
these last, one was about the size of the existing turkey, 
but taller, while another was much smaller. At this 
time, the mastodon lived along the Atlantic coast, while 
the far older turkeys of Colorado had as associates the 
huge Brontotherium and many other creatures long 
extinct. 
When the white men came to these shores they found 
turkeys in plenty. The flesh constituted a good share 
of the food of the natives, who wore cloaks or robes 
made of turkey feathers. Not very long after the 
discovery of the New World the bird was taken to 
282 
