Wild Turkey

 Wild Turkey

I have had one year of full-time observations in Vermont now, and there is something gratifying about the abundance of Wild Turkeys in our neighborhood, and in this state in general. The Wild Turkey is an amazing creature: many times larger than the average bird, seemingly slow moving, it has the appearance of something that would not last long in the presence of predators. But the turkey has lots of tricks up its sleeve.

 

First of all, the Wild Turkey is a very capable flier. This is counter to the description often presented in the popular press. I have come across turkeys while walking in the woods and in the fields when, once they see my full figure, decide to escape to a safer position with a very quick beating of the wings, sometimes rising in the air quite high and quite swiftly.  Apparently many people assume such a large, fat creature, so often seen on the ground, must be like an ostrich or emu or rhea, which are birds with similar foraging habits that gave up flight eons ago. Not our bird: North America's forest-dwelling wolves and cats forced the turkey to stay flight-capable despite its girth.

Second, the Wild Turkey is a social bird. Large flocks, in any bird species, help them keep aware of predators and avoid the pounce of a coyote, mountain lion, or bobcat.  It is such a joy to see our local flocks, numbering typically about 15 in the summer, but congregating to 50 in the fall, and on occasion in a few hundred in winter.  It was great to have our flock of 13 come right into our backyard in late September and lounge on the lawn in mid morning.

The scene in our yard in late September

The Wild Turkey is supremely well adapted to the combination of forest and open farmland in Vermont. They are essentially omnivores, going for all kinds of seeds, nuts, and insects, raking through the leaf litter with impressively long claws, which double as weapons when a predator gets too close. Salamanders and snakes also get consumed.

In this depressing era of decline of wildlife populations, the Wild Turkey resurgence is something to celebrate. It was formerly a victim of the great deforestation that blighted the Vermont landscape in the late 1700s and early 1800s. Reportedly, three quarters of the state’s forests were leveled, a landscape so crudely and massively altered that turkeys disappeared nearly entirely. As forests finally recovered and the state’s agencies awoke from their slumber, the birds were reintroduced (in 1969) from stock taken in neighboring northern New York State. In 2022, recovery must be effectively complete, given the fact that it is difficult to take a drive in rural parts of the state without seeing a flock or two foraging in harvested fields in the fall.

Wild Turkeys have now adapted even to towns and cities. I saw one in a Boston residential neighborhood a few months ago. Homeowners are starting to use the term “pest.” But, as with the Red Fox, you have to admire their ability to adapt and succeed, even in strange environments. I would rather have Wild Turkeys in urban parks than Rock Pigeons and Starlings that don’t belong.

 

Tracks in the snow. Seen in New Mexico, where the species has also come back successfully.

 

 

A group trotting through farmland down the road 

 Red Fox

We've been enjoying views of our local Red Fox for about the last year.  We must have one territorial pair, because they romp around in our fields with a lot of confidence, curling up for naps even out in the open. (We see only one at a time, though.) We've watched them mousing in the snowy fields. Today (late November), we watched the fox in a showdown with three White-tailed Deer.  The deer approached, stared, and the fox got up from its nap, stretched, and trotted off, after the deer passed within about 30 yards or so. Neither poses a real threat to the other.

Just like a canine, circling before settling in for a nap.

There's a bit of controversy surrounding the Red Fox that I find interesting. Some authorities (e.g. Vermont Fish and Wildlife) consider the creature to be introduced. The Gray Fox, smaller and more delicate (amazingly, a tree climber), and likely more stealthy, is native to the area. The motivation  for the introduction was to provide an animal exciting to hunt; so people experienced in hunting Red Foxes in Great Britain pushed to have them wandering the Vermont forests and fields.

The story seems logical, but leaves me with some doubt. As with birds, how much do we really know about pre-settlement wildlife? The early settlers didn't keep extensive records of what they saw: they were, understandably, preoccupied with surviving in an unforgiving landscape. They blasted away at wildlife for meat. The animals easy to find were the first to fall victim to human hunger. Is it possible the the Red Fox was here and then extirpated by settlers? (It could have suffered a range retraction to the north and west, where it graces the landscape today.) Today, the Red Fox seems so comfortable in its Vermont surroundings that one wonders if it has a niche, after all. It seems at least remotely possible that the "reintroduction" simply expanded on a natural recolonization of formerly occupied habitat.