THE TURKEY HISTORIC 91 



It is of a rather deep buffy-brown or ochre, very 

 thickly and quite uniformly speckled all over 

 with more or less minute specks of dark brown. 



Figure 23 was collected by H. R. Caldwell 

 (91310), the locality being unrecorded (Coll. 

 U. S. Nat. Museum, No. 32407), and measures 

 63 x 48. It is of a pale buffy-brown or pale cafe 

 au lait color, quite thickly speckled all over with 

 fine dots and specks of light brown. Some few 

 of the specks are of noticeably larger size, and 

 these are confined to the middle and apical 

 thirds. Speckling of the butt or big end ex- 

 tremely fine, and the specks of lighter color. 



Referring to the wild turkey (If. g. silvestris) 

 Bendire says (loc. cit., p. 116): "In shape, the 

 eggs of the Wild Turkey are usually ovate, oc- 

 casionally they are elongate ovate. The ground 

 color varies from pale creamy white to creamy 

 buff. They are more or less heavily marked 

 with well-defined spots and dots of pale choco- 

 late and reddish brown. In an occasional set 

 these spots are pale lavender. Generally the 

 markings are all small, ranging in size from a No. 

 6 shot to that of dust shot, but an exceptional 



