Vol 'l?i5 XI1 ] Wright, Early Records of the Wild Turkey. 361 



country, informs us that within ten years that he has passed in the 

 far west, the bee has advanced westward above a hundred miles. 

 It is said on the Missouri, that the wild turkey and the wild bee 

 go up the river together: neither are found in the upper regions. 

 It is but recently that the wild turkey has been killed on the Ne- 

 braska, or Platte and his travelling competitor, the wild bee ap- 

 peared there about the same time." A few years later, Fremont 

 on the Little Blue River (Neb.?) describes it as follows: 1 "The 

 stream was about fifty feet wide and three or four feet deep, 

 fringed with Cottonwood and willow, with frequent groves of oak 

 tenanted by flocks of turkeys." 



In 1846-1847, the Emory Reconnoisance meets the wild turkey 

 on several occasions. Of the Valley of Purgatory, the report has 

 it that 2 " the hills are bare of vegetation, except a few stunted 

 cedars; and the valley is said to be, occasionally, the resort of 

 grizzly bear, turkeys...." In Lieutenant Abert's Appendix of 

 this report are several notes on this form. He gives it amongst 

 the birds seen from Bent's Fort to Santa Fe, and holds "our road 

 leads through a region that abounds with the deer. . . .and the 

 turkey." Along the Purgatory River, "dense thickets, composed 

 of plum and the cherry interwoven with grape vines, formed 

 impenetratable thickets, where .... wild turkey, found a secure 

 shelter." Here "turkeys are very abundant," and, "they told us 

 that. ...they daily killed great numbers of ... .turkeys." Also 

 at Wakaroosa river, Kansas, he records that " Some of our hunters 

 went out and killed several wild turkeys (Meleagris gallopavo.)" 

 In 1848, J. Q. Thornton says the wild turkey is found east of the 

 Nebraska River. 3 In "The Overland stage," Messrs. Root and 

 Connelley assert that 4 " There was an abundance of wild game in 

 the '60's. In eastern Kansas large numbers of wild turkeys. . . . 

 were seen. Along the Little Blue River there were also many wild 



1 Fremont, J. C. Rept. of Exploring Expedition to the Rocky Mts. in the year 

 1842 and to Ore. and North California in the years 1843-1844. Washington, 

 1845, p. 15. 



2 Emory, W. H. Notes of a Military Reconnoisance from Fort Leavenworth in 

 Missouri to San Diego, in California, etc. New York, 1848, pp. 21, 405, 432, 437, 

 439, 524, 390. 



3 Thornton, J. Q. Oregon and California in 1848. N. Y. 1855, Vol. I, p. 41. 



4 Root, F. A., and Connelley, W. E. The Overland Stage to California. Topeka, 

 Kansas, 1901, p. 87. 



