1877.] The Wild Turkey and its Domestication. 327 
amalgamate and ever after range together, when each hen will 
take the same care of all as she did of her own. I have often 
seen three hens thus together leading around a large flock of 
young birds, the three broods being manifestly of unequal ages 
as they were of sizes. 
The flesh of the young wild turkey is as white as that of the 
tame turkey till mid winter. After that it begins to show a 
darker shade, and when a year old the change of color is very 
appreciable, and this darker shade deepens till the bird is several 
years old. All of this is entirely lost by domestication. I have 
never killed a bird from an egg taken from the wild hen’s nest 
in the woods, for I could not afford to do this, but I have had on 
my table many of the next generation, all the way from eight 
months to two or three years old, raised in my grounds. In every 
instance the flesh was as white as that of the domestic turkey. 
The change of food and the less active habits produce this 
change of color of the flesh of the wild turkey. 
Turkeys consume more herbaceous food than is generally sup- 
posed. In the spring, when fresh vegetation shoots forth, they 
subsist almost entirely upon it, showing less anxiety for corn 
than at any other season. Blue-grass and clover they seem to 
prefer, and on these they graze almost as freely as the geese. 
Later, when insects appear, they manifest their carnivorous ap- 
petite and become constant and diligent foragers for them. They 
are not scavengers like the barn-yard fowl, but much prefer, if 
they do not confine themselves to, living animals. Still they by 
no means limit their selection to insects. I once saw a half- 
grown turkey acting very strangely, and stopped a little way off 
to notice his actions. I soon observed that he was in a contest 
with a snake about ten inches long. He would pick it up and 
throw it and again seize it as soon as it struck the ground. At 
length, after the snake seemed pretty well disabled he seized it 
by the head and began to swallow it. The part of the snake 
yet in sight thrashed vigorously around, sometimes winding itself 
around the head and neck of the bird. This was too much for 
the turkey, and he threw it up and went at it again to make it 
more quiet, and then another attempt was made to swallow it; 
but it was not till the third effort was made that success was 
achieved, and then the process occupied several minutes, the tail 
of the snake being all the time active till it finally disappeared. 
this magnificent game bird was never a native of the Pacific 
coast. I have at various times sent in all about forty to Califor- 
e 
