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Location: Montreal, Quebec, Canada

I grew up in Ontario and Nunavut, and went to university in New Brunswick. For two years I lived in Ottawa, on the green belt. While I was there I wrote about nature. Then I moved to Montreal and I wrote nothing for a year. We've got nature here too, so I'm going to write about it.

Wednesday, April 11, 2007

Wild Turkeys !



I've heard that there are wild turkeys in Ottawa, but I never thought I'd wind up seeing them. This spring, however, Meleagris gallopavo has moved into the neighbourhood. There were five of them in the field out back this evening....oddly graceful, strange looking creatures. I only saw them from the window....it's difficult to get very close to them, and I was content to watch them from afar. However, one was larger than the others. I would assume, from what I've read, that it was male. Male wild turkey's are polygamous. This male has probably chosen that part of the greenbelt as his territory. Males will often have as many as five females in their turf. I wouldn't be at all suprized if we saw alot more turkeys now. They tend to nest in open areas, since they have great vision. nesting in the open lets them take advantage of that. Also, most of their diet is grass. although they're omnivorous. A field is a prime location for them.


For the record, wild turkeys are alot smarter than their domestic counterparts. Which is good, because a species that doesn't have enough sense to avoid drowning in a heavy rain probably has no place in the wild.

3 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Wild turkeys... now that is cool. I'm going to look up the Latin name and see what they look like.

Morgan

12:59 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

They make me think of the turkeys we used to make in primary school out of black construction paper for the bodies and a fan of orange for the tail. Did you ever make those? I never could figure out what they had to do with "real" turkeys -- barn-raised ones -- which are not, I think, black. Now I know.

3:08 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Interesting to know.

1:03 AM  

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