The leaves have dropped and the winds are blowing cold and damp out of the north transforming the fall landscape into an early winter scene. We are in the in-between season. You know, in between autumn and winter when the landscape is painted in monotone shades of brown and gray. It’s the time of year that always makes me think of turkeys. No doubt it’s because of the impending holiday–Thanksgiving.

The Wild Turkey which is the bird’s official common name breaks down into “wild” as opposed to domesticated fowl and “Turkey” which came from Carl Linnaeus (1707-1778) who named the genus where Turkeys are classified. All birds in the guineafowl family, which include grouse, were called turkey in the mistaken belief they came from the country of Turkey. When the Wild Turkey was introduced to Europe from America, they also called this “new” bird turkey because it resembled the guineafowl they were already familiar with.

There are two species of turkey in the world and both are found only in the New World. The Ocellated Turkey (Meleagris ocellata) which is found in Central America. It has a small range and is not very common. The other is the Eastern Wild Turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) which is found in the United States and has a large range and is fairly common.

The Wild Turkey is found in forested regions all across the eastern two-thirds of the country from Maine down the east coast to central Florida and west to the Rocky Mountains reaching as far north as the southern edge of Canada. There are also populations that occur in central Mexico. There are at least five distinct subspecies of the Wild Turkey found in the United States. Some will argue more subspecies and others argue less. The subspecies are all based on variations in plumage, over all size and geographical distribution. Here are the five subspecies that most can agree upon. (Eastern, Osceola, Rio Grande, Merriam’s and Gould’s)

As with most species that live across a large geographical range, the turkeys in northern states are largest while the ones in the southern states and Mexico are the smallest. This is Bergmann’s zoological rule which correlates latitude with the body mass of birds and animals. The further north latitude the bird or animal is living the larger the body mass and visa-versa. This all relates to the fact that larger body mass is easier to keep warm during cold winters and smaller body mass is easier to keep cool in hot summers.

The adult male turkey, which is called a tom or gobbler, in the northern states can stand nearly four feet tall and weight up to 20 or more pounds. It is up to one third smaller in southern states such as Florida.

Due to their large and obvious size and over all good taste the Wild Turkey was a prime target for substance hunting in the early years of the United States. Thus the population of turkey was nearly wiped out in many parts of the country even before the early 1900’s, Small pockets of turkeys held on in couple parts of the country. In the mid 1900’s efforts were made to reintroduce the Wild Turkey to its former range. Turkeys were trapped in the regions that still had them and relocated to suitable habitat all across the US.

The expectation for these newly released birds where not very high. It was expected that small populations of turkeys would become established only in suitable habitat but not much more. However what did happen was the population of turkeys took off and not only filled in the suitable habitat but also filled in what was thought to be not suitable habitat such as suburban parks and yards. In addition the turkeys started to move further north than they had historically ranged.

Fast forward to today and turkeys have been restored to their former range and also to regions that didn’t have turkeys in the past. Now that is what I call a success story. Until next time

Stan Tekiela is an author/naturalist and wildlife photographer who travels the US to study and photograph wildlife. He can be contacted via his web page at www.naturesmart.com