How Wild Turkeys Find Love
As spring bursts forth, wild turkeys begin the mating game. Groups congregate in lawns and fields — and sometimes in the middle of the street. Males puff out their iridescent feathers, fan their tails and drag their wings on the ground in a vie for the right to breed. Their faces and necks turn dazzling shades of blue and red.
Once rare and elusive denizens of America’s woodlands, these heaviest of the galliform birds (chickens and their relatives) have gone urban. Wild turkeys live in the residential neighborhoods around my home in Madison, Wis.
A few years ago, their elaborate courtship displays fascinated me so much that I began to photograph them — and, as I’ve learned, there’s more happening than meets the eye.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/21/travel/wild-turkeys-mates.html
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But I know what happens, saw it in my driveway once. I was awakened by a commotion outside early on a Saturday.
Wondering what all the noise was about, since the nearest neighbor was at least 1/2 mile away, I went out on the porch to see what was up.
Down at the end of the house and garage in the parking area were about twenty hens huddled in a tight circle, all milling about nervously in place while about five or six around the edges of the circle squawked loudly as if announcing to the world the presence of some menace that was haunting them. Every few minutes one or two of the nervous crowd would bust out and make a loop back into the crowd.
Meanwhile... the six resident toms - they roosted in our back yard - slowly strutted around, all puffed out in full bloom, occasionally approaching the group where one would blurt out a quick gobble. At this, the crowd would burst into a tizzy releasing yet a few more out of the perimeter who would then be chased by the toms until they found their way back into the group.
This went on for at least an hour, I didn't see if anyone got lucky.
